Three-wheeled vehicle, with one big wheel (Sean Connery) and two little ones (Dustin Hoffman, Matthew Broderick), about three generations of thieves who throw in together, over the initial objections of the middle-classified middle one, on a million-dollar caper. The situation is highly contrived (all the way to the ethnic mix of the characters: Scottish, Scottish-Sicilian, Scottish-Sicilian-Jewish), but it nevertheless is, or seems, rich in the possibilities of playing off the concept of Family Honor against that of Honor Among Thieves. It somehow never pays off, and it does a great deal of inefficient rummaging around in the effort. Was it really necessary, for instance, to go through two entire Irish wakes, complete with a solo-and-chorus "Danny Boy" both times, in order to make certain we will understand the ritual? John Ford surely wouldn't have thought so, but maybe Sidney Lumet, who's much more comfortable here with the Jewish festivities, was not too sure: the result is that the one that was supposed to "move" us, moves us only to impatience; the one that was supposed to have been the practice run had already tapped all available sentiment. And the all-over ashen color of the movie makes it look suspiciously like a cadaver from the start. (1989) — Duncan Shepherd
This movie is not currently in theaters.