vchimpanzee 10. We know this movie takes place sometime in the past because cigarettes are advertised, and people smoke, in a movie theater. Pauline is a beautiful blonde who is dressed for prom, but she goes to the theater.  Several rows behind her is Leon Redbone (okay, Leon's clothes are white, but the man does look a lot like him), with an attractive woman who doesn't compare to Pauline. The man dressed like Leon Redbone, whose name is Eddie, meets Pauline outside, where she is smoking, and she tells him the woman in the movie should have left the man because the man was a criminal. Eddie disagrees but later in the movie admits he'd like to be like the man in the movie.9. Eddie owes Roy money, and when Roy wants something, he sends big goons to get it. The girl from the theater won't help him any more. Eddie's furniture store is not successful. There is one solution.8. ... Okay, I lost track of what the numbers meant. Just know that by the end of the movie we have counted down to 1. Eddie meets Pauline and starts spending time with her. This means she sits in his '66 Ford LTD while Eddie goes inside with a fake gun and hands the teller a note. The money from one robbery isn't enough to keep Roy's goons away, so Eddie can't stop with just one robbery. He is always quite polite, though not charming like John Stamos, which is the impression various tellers give on the TV news.  He's actually somewhere between socially awkward and mentally ill. The tellers are usually calm. One blonde girl is so pretty and so nice. And then there is the quirky and very friendly Sue, who I immediately recognized as Kate Micucci of "Raising Hope". Later, when one man who says he is a Mormon makes the situation more difficult, and the poor teller with him ends up traumatized, but that's the only really bad incident.The cops seem incapable of stopping these robberies. They don't know just what to do. So they keep happening. Eddie Dodson becomes a legend.One thing I don't understand: the listings with my TiVo said this movie was based on fact, and yet the closing credits include the statement that it is a work of fiction.Occasionally this movie is funny,  and I'm sure it was supposed to be. But it's not quite a comedy. It's also not the wild and wacky adventure I expected from the description. It's still somewhat fun to watch, and Micucci is cute.Jim Sturgess does a good enough job as the lead. If he wasn't supposed to be a John Stamos type, then I would say he succeeded.Several clueless bimbos hang out with Eddie, but they are played by respected, big-name actresses. I guess that's okay. There are other quirky characters in the night clubs and other hangouts where Eddie goes. One of the detectives seems intelligent enough, so I wonder why the cops can't seem to do anything. I don't remember the detective's name and I can't see any clue in the credits. But it was a good performance, whoever it was.I think this was worth seeing.

subxerogravity The movie went too slow for the pace I'm use to.And for a movie about a bank robber, it was boring.Seem they relied too much on how viewers wood react to the excitement of robbing a bank vs putting it on screen.The nostalgia of the 1980s was faint to. They tired with the 80s music but overall I was disinterested.Jim Struggs was actually pretty good though. Found him funny and enjoyable to watch as a furtive store owner looking to pay back a shark loan by robbing banks. Unfortunately, it's not enough to make the movie and neither was the mostly cameo appearance of Patricia Arquette, who the ad people decided to milked her academy award win to promote the movie and Chloë Sevigny.I'd skip it

Susan Bayre I am not often given to writing reviews. Often with bad films, I take the Zen view that the director/actors tried and, heck, it didn't work out so I would let it be.But this film grated on me so much that this deserves a viewer sanity health warning. None of the characters make much sense (hence one is frustrated by their inane, illogical actions) and for certain none of them have any charm. Especially not Jim Sturgess, an annoying apology of an actor who wouldn't be able to inspire a blind lady on a walking frame to use his help cross the road, even if she wanted to. Isabel Lucas wasted her time looking vacuous and pointless to the point where she manages to convince the viewer that she must be, ultimately, a little brain-dead. And this is the only movie where a crime boss lets an admitted defaulter off 3 times without any form of punishment other than some stern words. You get the realism now?My husband stayed till the end and informed me that the ending was as sappy and meaningless as the rest of the movie. I had left after the so- called bank robberies to watch a proper movie on my iPad in the car park. Yes, this movie is *that* bad.

artrouble21 One could write the entire plot of the movie in here and it wouldn't be a spoiler. Thats because this film is not about Eddie Dodson, it's about who ever the character called Eddie Dodson in this film thinks he's portraying. Dodson was a bit more than a furniture salesman, his shop on Melrose wrote the script for a hundred quirky 20th century/retro/moderne shops that followed in his wake and that includes all the original 70's Hollywood funk and fun. Out and about you might have caught Eddie cruising Melrose in a 1930's convertible with a bevy of gals or run into him at a party in the Hills. Three things one can credit the film with are the Hollywood pretty people which was spot on for that time- probably still is- the excellent soundtrack and the resemblance of Jim Sturgess to Eddie, but there it ends character wise and with the absurd fedora. Eddie was famous not just for the number of bank robberies he pulled but also for the Yankee cap he always wore to a bank giving him name he was known for, the Yankee Bandit. Eddies story is far more Hollywood insane than this film can deal with it seems, his connection to some big Hollywood names, his drug addiction- Its not hard to find with google- is not touched upon. What this movie is however is an effete homage to a time and place that was a lot more brash and impulsive. It's main character may have some interesting aspects but they don't add up to the type of person that drove Eddie to do what he did. Can the movie stand on it's own given the absence of any real motivation on the protagonists part? Maybe but it's point is the people and the period and it barely goes there. If you view it knowing nothing of Dodson it might work for you but if you knew Eddie you are in for a disappointment. And if you find out about Dodson after you watch it you'll be miffed they didn't make the actual Eddie Dodson story. The directors seems to have had the components but not the story. Throwing in John Doe of the LA period punk band X playing a cop only underlines this point.