'44 Minutes' is a compelling half reality, half fiction look at the infamous 'Bank of America' robbery in '97. Two masked suspects wielding fully automatic weapons and full body armor went head to head with the LAPD when the bank job went south. This made for tv movie hits a lot of the right notes, features a good cast, but general melodrama is inserted to pad the runtime and supplement the known facts, event.
You might remember when this crazy moment happened as it was larger than life. The violence spilling out into the streets, TV news copters circling around getting us closer to the insanity. Heavily outgunned, miraculously the only people who lost their lives that day were the bad guys. The first half establishes the band of characters, dives into some real life history of the suspects. The rest is the actual event played out and the lasting effects from a semi-fictionalized account.
Big real life tough guys Andrew Bryniarski & Oleg Taktarov play the fictionalized accounts of the real life suspects. Establishes faces (Michael Madsen, Mario Van Peebles) play heavily featured but fictional cops. Ron Livingston plays his real-life SWAT counterpart. Throughout the entire movie there's personal tv news interviews with them. Talking about being cops and offering their thoughts on the ordeal. Some of the dialog is crisp & well delivered, but it's also 100% unabatingly pro police. LAPD certainly felt alienated from the public at this time, but it's not like it was all unwarranted.
'44 Minutes: The North Hollywood Shoot-Out' was a winner for the FX network when it aired in 2003. It was decent then and still is today. It does a good job capturing the atmosphere, reenacting the brutal moments of the event in good detail. Solid acting & entertaining bits of action. The only thing that brings this 81 min movie down is the dramatic padding and the commercial break "moments" due to it's made-for-tv origins.
You might remember when this crazy moment happened as it was larger than life. The violence spilling out into the streets, TV news copters circling around getting us closer to the insanity. Heavily outgunned, miraculously the only people who lost their lives that day were the bad guys. The first half establishes the band of characters, dives into some real life history of the suspects. The rest is the actual event played out and the lasting effects from a semi-fictionalized account.
Big real life tough guys Andrew Bryniarski & Oleg Taktarov play the fictionalized accounts of the real life suspects. Establishes faces (Michael Madsen, Mario Van Peebles) play heavily featured but fictional cops. Ron Livingston plays his real-life SWAT counterpart. Throughout the entire movie there's personal tv news interviews with them. Talking about being cops and offering their thoughts on the ordeal. Some of the dialog is crisp & well delivered, but it's also 100% unabatingly pro police. LAPD certainly felt alienated from the public at this time, but it's not like it was all unwarranted.
'44 Minutes: The North Hollywood Shoot-Out' was a winner for the FX network when it aired in 2003. It was decent then and still is today. It does a good job capturing the atmosphere, reenacting the brutal moments of the event in good detail. Solid acting & entertaining bits of action. The only thing that brings this 81 min movie down is the dramatic padding and the commercial break "moments" due to it's made-for-tv origins.