Sorry, this movie sucks

Great Film overall

Best movie ever!

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

The Thomas Crown Affair is one of those films that just screams 1960s cool, from the fashions to the jazz score. Yet the film is not a case of nostalgic style over substance, but a bittersweet character study of McQueen and Dunaway's characters who use thrills as a substitute for meaning in their otherwise empty lives. While the film revels in glamorous vistas and "lifestyle porn," there are several scenes set in graveyards which foreshadow the movie's bittersweet conclusion. In the end, love doesn't conquer all and McQuen's escape is purely superficial; he remains imprisoned by his own hedonistic lifestyle and the viewer is left wondering if he'll ever be able to escape it.While some of the stylistic choices of the film have dated (the use of split-screen for one), I don't think they've dated as badly as other reviewers claim. Otherwise, the film has held up remarkably well, both of its time and yet transcending it, as many true classics have.

The blatant miscasting of both Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway is one reason why the heist movie "The Thomas Crown Affair" doesn't work for me. He's a high-class entrepenurial criminal and she's the insurance investigator who's on to him; they're like Ken and Barbie playing at being grown-ups. It was directed by Norman Jewison, hot from his success with "In the Heat of the Night" and this time he's aiming at cool. Dunaway and McQueen are cool alright but they are also all wrong. It's a clever picture that revels in its own cleverness, (and use of the split-screen), and it was a huge success but it's also not nearly as clever as it thinks it is.

A few thoughts...some of the ways that they try to capture the crooks are so unethical that truly all the law enforcement and insurance investigators would be up on criminal charges. What a previous reviewer found sexy in the chess game would probably draw snickers from today's audiences...almost as a parody. Lastly, I guess they still felt that the cops and robbers had to wear hats, when this was really filmed at a time when hats were no longer being worn except by old men. It was out of style by then. I hear that the remake was also quite good but over-sexed. Unfortunately, Hollywood likes to remake good movies more than remaking bad movies and making them better.

Not what I expected. I expected a movie centered around Steve McQueen pulling off a heist. But actually it's a movie where the (brief) heist occurs early and the rest of the movie is about an insurance investigator played by Faye Dunaway trying to snare McQueen. The leaps of logic that allow Dunaway to get on McQueen's trail strain credulity even more than the implausible heist. The plot leaks like a sieve but the flashy direction and charismatic performances by the leads keeps you interested. McQueen and Dunaway definitely had chemistry. Hard to believe that terrible theme song won an Oscar. It's a good film so give it a shot, especially if you're a fan of "the king of cool" Steve McQueen.