LOVE AMONG THIEVES
US, 1987, 100 minutes, Colour.
Audrey Hepburn, Robert Wagner, Patrick Bauchau, Brion James, Samantha Eggar, Jerry Orbach.
Directed by Roger Young.
Love Among Thieves is an average telemovie entertainment. It is a caper movie, the robbery of Czarist-decorated eggs in San Francisco, pursuits to Mexico, mayhem with pursued and pursuers.
However, the film is of interest since Audrey Hepburn is the star. She is her glamorous self, a baroness, famous pianist, stealing in order to save her fiance who has been kidnapped - but, of course, is the victim of a plot. A bearded Robert Wagner is a rather smooth and suave hero-villain. Jerry Orbach
looks to be the villain but turns out to by the FBI. Patrick Bachau is the fiance who is the real villain, in cahoots with villainess Samantha Eggar.
There is enough San Francisco and Mexican glamour and location photography to make it an enjoyable pastime, even if it is not particularly original,. It has echoes of the '30s screwball comedy with the heiress and the hero on the run and in difficult situations. And at times the dialogue tries to be this tongue-in-cheek screwball humour. Direction is by Roger Young (Lasseter, Gulag).
1. Enjoyable caper telemovie? Familiar material? For the television audience?
2. San Francisco locations, Mexican locations? Outdoor action? Stunts and special effects? Musical score?
3. The title and its irony? The identity of those who are honest, those who are dishonest? The final ironies?
4. The focus on the robbery, the alarm, suspicions? Caroline and the contacts? The kidnapping? The plausibility of the flights to Mexico, the chases, the adventures in the Mexican town and countryside? The return to San Francisco? Plausibility of this kind of caper adventure?
5. Audrey Hepburn's style as Caroline: baroness, pianist, stealing, her friendship with Solange? Her concern about Alan? The robbery, the flight, the comedy of clashing with Mike Chambers in the plane? in the car? Their shared adventures? Her suspicions of him? Discovery of the truth about Alan? Trying to get out of Mexico? The clashes with Spicer? Arrests? San Francisco? Double cross? The finale - and the glamorous baroness ending happily ever after?
6. Robert Wagner's laid-back style as Mike, the screwball comedy interchanges with Caroline, sharing the adventures, rescuing her, the mystery about his identity, his disappearance, reappearance at the end?
7. Solange and her friendship, betrayal? Her relationship with Alan? The set-up for Caroline to steal? Alan and his contacts in Mexico? Their villainy?
8. Spicer and his seeming to be the villain, the irony that he was FBI?
9. A sufficient blend of wisecracking, tongue-in-cheek dialogue, glamorous characters, a caper, exotic locations, mix-ups?
