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Sneakers
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Sneakers is an effortlessly
entertaining film.
A
surprising choice of project for director Phil Alden Robinson after the lyrical
heights of Field of Dreams (1989), it resembles a Michael Caine heist movie of the ‘60s
rejigged for the information age and the New World Order.
While
its surface techno-dazzle recalls contemporary, cautionary fables like War Games (1983), its charm clearly
derives from an earlier cinematic model, the Cary Grant comedy-thrillers made
by Hitchcock.
The
story line involves a team of sneakers – communications, surveillance and
break-in experts – who are all, in one way or another, social misfits.
One
day, government agents arrive with a mission to break the routine of their not
especially glamorous sneaking. Assigned to obtain the black box invented by a
brilliant cryptographer – a computer device that can unscramble the most
zealously guarded of state secrets – the freelance team is soon plunged into an
abyss of political duplicities and rivalries.
Robinson
clearly had problems giving ample time to all the characters in the ensemble,
but Sidney Poitier, Ben Kingsley and David Strathairn make an especially vivid
impression, while Robert Redford demonstrates the smooth, comic side of his persona
that has been overlooked in recent years.
Sneakers is a thoughtful, colourful and intricate film.
MORE Redford: Quiz Show, Up Close & Personal, The Clearing, Indecent Proposal, The Horse Whisperer, The Legend of Bagger Vance © Adrian Martin July 1993 |
