The Thomas Crown Affair

Fun heist flick. So very late 60's cinema with the jazz score and the multi screen shots. Bonus points for Dunaway giving a hand job to a chess piece.

A colleague gave me a list of Steve McQueen movies to watch, and since I vaguely remember seeing the 1999 remake I decided to start with this one. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The editing at the start was amazing. That must've been edited by hand. I loved the story and pacing and the chemistry between Thomas and Vicki.

I just can't stand jazz.

Im gonna rewatch the remake soon see if it's any good but this got me excited for the next Steve McQueen movie on my list.

Still pretty good.

McQueen oozes screen-presence and there's a pattern to having him say as little as possible for fear of undermining that.

The heist at the start is clever. He's unreadable throughout for his real motivations towards the investigator.

I watched this some 25 years ago and hated how long the periods without dialogue are. This time round it didn't bother me at all. The second beahc buggy scene was the only bit that did.

I've merely watched this ahead of the Pierce Brosnan remake as I wish to compare the two. That said, I'm glad I did rewatch. One of McQueen's better roles.


7/10

I´ll have to admit I was fairly bored by this. Always thought this was one of the great movies. Well, maybe it was at the time. It looked pretty innovative with the camera angels and those split screen scenes. But on the other side it goes to considerable lenght with little or no dialogue. The story itself is rather thin. And it is definitely more of a drama/romance than a crime thriller.
So interesting to look at but not something I´d consider cult or must-see.

This movie has to be on the agenda for every 1960's film study course. You get a little bit of everything. First off, pretty cool heist scene where Thomas Crown acts as the planner and never lets his co-conspirators see his face. Split screen action sequences can be cool and effective but here I felt they were just plain annoying. I loved the casting of Faye Dunaway as Vicki our insurance investigator. You never really could tell if she was being played by Thomas or doing the playing until the final scene. The very sensual chess scene between the two antagonists was well done. Ohh and the soundtrack. Academy Award winner "Windmills of Your Mind". OMG. Enough about that. Give this a watch and enjoy the "King of Cool" as the lovable criminal doing all his own stunts, unheard of today except for Jackie Chan.