TOWER HEIST
3 out of 5 stars

ohhhhh, ben stiller... how is it that a comedian happens to get less funnier in the movies he stars in? eddie murphy saves this one with his ghetto-thug-fast-tawkin’-wannabe thief character slide. i’m glad he’s stopped doning in drag/putting on a fat suit to pass off as comedy these days... :P

tower heist is all about a bunch of working stiffs in a super-luxe hotel-like apartment complex in NYC called the tower, who lose their pensions to a bernie madoff-like billionaire arthur shaw. (a very slimy alan alda AKA hawkeye pierce from M*A*S*H!) josh kovaks (ben stiller) is the assistant building manager (i think- still not clear what his exact title was), and he’s got this shit down... he knows all his tennants’ schedules, their preferences for meals, their birthdays, their vacay schedules...the works. he even knows all about his underlings AKA the bellhops, the elevator men, the maids, security personnel, repair men’s quirks and life issues (i.e. one russian chick is studying for the bar exam and odessa AKA precious is on a jamaican maid on a work visa so she’s looking for a green card husband. LOL!) his BFF is lester the doorman, and he learns that lester is planning to retire soon... the following day or so, josh finds it weird when armed men in black suits approach the tower. they go under code black (“what the hell is that?”), and josh sees poor arthur getting kidnapped via a white laundry cleaning service van! he chases after it, but then they’re surrounded by FBI agents, head by lead agent claire denham. (tea leoni) he’s all WTF, but as it turns out arthur shaw is arrested by the FBI for several SEC violations and accused of running a ponzi scheme. josh is devestated because he realizes that ALL their $ is gone. (his and everyone who works at the tower) he doesn’t know exactly how to get it back, but one drunken night, he and agent denham are having drinks after he gets fired for beating up mr. shaw’s prized 1963 ferrari 250 GT lusso (the steve mcqueen car!), and gets the idea to steal it back by breaking into shaw’s safe. so, he enlists the help of his useless bro-in-law charlie (casey affleck), this bellhop guy named enrique who used to work at the “BK” (michael pena), odessa (gabourey sidibe), mr. fitzhugh who got kicked out of the tower due to foreclosure (matthew broderick), and last but not least...slide. :P (a hilarious eddie murphy)

probably one of the best scenes in the whole movie is when slide is trying to teach the dudes how to be theives. (i.e. first lesson at the mall – “you may have stolen $50 in merchandise but i just stole $256. never trust a thief with your wallet, bitches” and when they’re on the roof of slide’s apt building- “here’s your punkass bobby pin. figure out how to unlock this door. i’m gonna go have sex with rita now” :P) everything else just leads up to the actual heist... hollywood had originally planned to make this the “black version of ocean’s 11”, and i sort of wish they stuck by that! this was entertaining enough, but i think it would have been awesome to see eddie as george and chris tucker as rusty. the two of them would have made me ROTFLMAO... :P