Please don't spend money on this.

Excellent, smart action film.

Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

Burt Reynolds broke out of his leading man pigeonhole to attempt, for once, a more believable role, playing a middle-aged, low-rent burglar who enlists the help of a dumb but loyal grease monkey and then proceeds to give him lessons in both larceny and life. There are a few heists along the way, but this is more a character study than a caper film, and it works in large part because of the rapport and timing between Reynolds and his blue collar sidekick Casey Siemaszko. Both characters are losers, and it might be argued that losers make more engaging heroes, perhaps because they're easier to identify with. In the spirit of earlier Bill Forsythe films it's a slim but disarming comedy, with an extra measure of depth in the canny screenplay by John Sayles, as always the working man's champion, who along the way makes some minor but interesting points about the haves and the have-nots.

Burt Reynolds has had a very shaky career. Truth be told he has made far more bad movies than he has good movies. I personally believe it is because of very poor choices, such as , lame cop movies, smokey and the bandit sequels and both cannonball run flicks. However, amongst the very large pile of "ruff" this movie is a real diamond. His character of "Earnie", the gruff but lovable experienced thief taking a young naive kid under his wing trying to teach him the ropes and tricks of the trade is done with such subtle depth by Reynolds, that it caught me completely and delightfully offgaurd. When you think about it, this was not a big budget movie and Burt gives a fantastic performance just like he does in "Boogie Nights", which is also not a big budget film. Yet when it is a huge budget movie, Reynolds tends to give rather unispired and perfunctory performances. Maybe he should stick with these indie flicks more often.

I'm as puzzled as another viewer who disagreed with the hype that this was going to be Burt Reynolds' big comeback or that this was his greatest ever return to film. Why? Though taken out of context, this movie doesn't seem like it had much pull when it was released in 1989 and is terribly forgotten today. I would also agree with this viewer that the movie was only half good, but slightly more than just a few minutes worth of entertainment.Burt Reynolds plays safe cracker, Ernie Mullins. Casey Seimaszko plays Mike, his somewhat cocky young apprentice. The two happen to meet while breaking in to the same house--Mike just to lounge in an empty house and freeload on food and booze, and Ernie for the treasures of the house safe. Ernie takes Mike in, shows him the ropes, and the two are basically in business together. And they're good at what they do. About the time that Mike screws up and gets in way over his head, pissing off Ernie with his overconfidence and wrecking things with his prostitute girlfriend, this is the point where the movie takes a dive because it never manages to recapture the smart-mouthed quick wit of the first half of the movie which at least made some of it funny. Soon, it just topples for either lack of a better resolution, having too much of a moralistic ending, or the filmmakers just seemed unsure of what direction to finally take it in the end (perhaps one of those films that the studios rushed to release, I can't be sure). I haven't yet decided after only one viewing which one I'm leaning toward. But there was something odd there that entirely disrupted the jib of the traditional three acts of the film. Almost as though we are watching two different movies by the way the pace and genre suddenly shifts. Too bad. It looked like with Mike's cocky youth attitude and Ernie as a sort of cynic, it could've been a much funnier production.This one isn't something that I'd recommend or not recommend, but would simply say that if you didn't see it, you're not missing anything.

I remember seeing this little film in the theater. It was a second run theater and this was the second part of a double feature with "The Abyss" which I had actually gone to see. I stuck around for this, not expecting much as Burt reynolds didn't have much a career going at this point. Boy, was I surprised! This film is a gem. A low-key comedy, where the humor doesn't come from gross-out belly laughs but from characters we can relate to. It was such a treat to see Reynolds shelve his tough-guy, trans-am persona and tackle a character role, showing warmth and depth akin to his work in Boogie Nights. I admit to a fondness for "caper" movies, and while this one fits the bill, it's not quite as clever in that department as some others, but this movie isn't about being clever, it's about people and how they relate to each other, even in the realm of burglars. If you haven't seen this, it's well worth renting.