Official Synopsis:
After interrupting a bank robbery in progress, Jason "Jinx" Taylor (Nick Stahl) gets locked in the vault with sexy cyber-thief Jessica (Erika Christensen). Now they must outsmart the bank robber, Simon (Gavin Rossdale), whose frustration and anger is building as he tries to negotiate with the SWAT team while holding frightened hostages at gunpoint. Full of surprising twists at every turn, How to Rob a Bank is a thrill-a-minute roller coaster ride that delivers non-stop action from start to finish!
  
Our Take:
I’m a great fan of plays and the format of most theater. Anytime you have a couple of fascinating characters hashing it out in a single room or two, I’m enthused to watch it. Alongside those lines, I’m a fan of films that stick to single room for the entirety of their run time. And while How To Rob A Bank isn’t 100% confined to a single room, it’s pretty darn close and it’s all the better because of that.

The majority of this movie takes place inside a bank’s vault with nothing more than a table, a cell phone, a computer, Erika Christensen and Nick Stahl. The dialogue between them is always fun or funny and if things ever slow down the cell phone will ring in from one of a few other locations. The first one is right outside the vault with the actual bank robbers (played by Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale along with Leo Fitzpatrick) and then the other main vantage point in the movie is with the cops right outside the building. I know this isn’t new territory per se for a bank robbery movie, as most of them do take place largely in or around the scene of the crime, but I’m singling this one out here because of how much of that time is spent locked up inside the vault with just Stahl and Christensen.

Nick Stahl, the star of our little bank robbery gone awry, was once looked upon as a young actor priming himself up for a long ride of Academy Awards. He has since dissipated in the view of the public, but not from my view. While his roles haven’t always been as demanding as of late he still brings a fun presence to the screen that, even though his ability isn’t shown at full force, is still a damn good performance.

Special features include:

* The Making Of How To Rob A Bank: The Story (4 minutes).

* The Making Of How To Rob A Bank: The Characters (6 minutes) – Why these needed to be two separate features, I do not know.

How To Rob A Bank is a movie that you’re probably going to one day find in a bargain bin, simply because it’s not a huge blockbuster movie. When you do, give it a gamble and walk away pleased with the fact that you actually got more than your money’s worth.

Overall Picture:
Movie: B
DVD: C+

- Landen Chase Pelish
Staff Writer