Customer Reviews

Silver Bears [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.4 Import - Australia ]

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you are a Michael Caine fan, you've got to get this one. It is Michael at his best in an excellent plot about con artists conning con artists. It is typical MC wit and humour and is strangely not that well known, which surprises me as it is a very good movie. Starts off in Las Vegas where the first criminal element is introduced (MC works for them although not a criminal himself). The story then shifts to Geneva, Switzerland, where we are introduced to a few more characters. Another brief trip to Persia introduces the con and before going back to Geneva. A great story with an entertaining plot - even the non-MC fans will enjoy it.

This is a really good movie. As a previous reviewer said, it is the story of a con artist getting conned, based on the book by Paul Erdman. It is the story of a bank fraud scheme that went south. Most of the action is in London, Lugano, and Morocco (standing in for Persian Gulf countries).

Actors not mentioned in the blurb include Tommy Smothers (as the patsy), Jeremy Clyde (as the commodity trader who puts him up to it), Martin Balsam as the gangster Joe Fiori, and Jay Leno in a really good performance as Fiori's son.

I hope it eventually comes out in NTSC DVD format, because the only way to watch it on American equipment right now seems to be on the mediocre VHS tape. The original movie was done in monophonic (it was 1977 after all), but it had a 2.35:1 aspect ratio. The transfer to 4:3 VHS tape squashed the picture down quite a bit, notably in the ending scenes.