With Den of Thieves, debuting director Christian Gudegast has made a heist sandwich, with bookended shootouts subbing for slices of Wonder Bread. Having penned the 2016 action sequel London Has Fallen, Gudegast sticks with the ingredient he knows best: Gerard Butler.
The Geostorm star takes the lead as “Big Nick” O’Brien, a detective with the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department. As the head of its Major Crimes division, O’Brien is a roguish bender and breaker of rules — your basic bundle of unshaven swagger. He also operates within that swath of gray that allows him to act like the criminals he earns a salary to catch; the movie more than suggests the only difference between O’Brien and his prey is the badge — in fact, it underlines it in a finale that literally sticks a label on the lawman (“SHERIFF”) to distinguish him from the other armed tough guy in a bulletproof vest.
The other armed tough guy in a bulletproof vest is Merrimen (Pablo Schreiber, 2018’s Skyscraper), a freshly sprung felon who wastes no time planning the heist of a lifetime: robbing the Federal Reserve Bank of Los Angeles of millions in untraceable cash headed for the shredder. Stuck between the two men is Donnie (O’Shea Jackson Jr., Straight Outta Compton), a member of Merrimen’s crew forced to be an informant to O’Brien.
Playing like Michael Mann’s Heat shorn of its great soundtrack and Oscar-caliber performances, Den of Thieves could be called Canned Heat. With swinging-dick posturing and testosterone squeezed from each sprocket of film, it also could be called the greatest David Ayer movie David Ayer did not make, presumably because he was too busy counting his Netflix bucks. Meanwhile, Gudegast swoops in and shoves an overstuffed crime epic onto our plate, complete with an ending that dares to go full Keyzer Söze. We didn’t ask for Den, and it sure didn’t look good, but once we took a bite … we liked it! Hey, Mikey! —Rod Lott