Product Details

• Actors: Diane Bradley, Cindy Carver, Tony Darrow, Crystal Field, Ray Garvey
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, HiFi Sound, NTSC
• Language: English
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Dreamworks Video
• VHS Release Date: May 22, 2001
• Run Time: 95 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (78 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00003CXGR
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #17,306 in Video (See Bestsellers in Video)

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  Video > Comedy > Comedy Stars > Tracey Ullman

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

After a run of serious-tinged comedies like Deconstructing Harry, Celebrity, and Sweet and Lowdown, Woody Allen turns to pure farce with the lightweight, appealing Small Time Crooks, the sunniest film Allen's made in years. Doing a 180 from his nebbishy intellectual persona, Allen plays a less-than-smart ex-con named Ray, who can't even keep a dishwasher job and is perennially supported by his wife Frenchy (Tracey Ullman). When Ray hatches a plot to lease a storefront near a bank and tunnel into the bank's vault, Frenchy is skeptical about putting their life savings behind the scheme, especially after meeting Ray's dim-bulb trio of support (Michael Rapaport, Jon Lovitz, and Tony Darrow, all sublimely ridiculous) and learning she's supposed to provide the front by opening up a cookie store. Soon enough, their get-rich-quick scheme pays off, but not the way they anticipated, and they're suddenly swimming in money and bad taste. All of Allen's farcical shenanigans are basically a setup for a look at Ray's and Frenchy's diverging paths--she wants culture and upper-class acceptance, he wants pizza in front of the TV and poker with his pals. Soon, the lowbrow Frenchy enlists a fortune-digging art broker (Hugh Grant) to make her a lady, and Allen plans a high society robbery with the help of Frenchy's dimwit cousin (Elaine May, who makes an art form of comic stupidity). It's absolutely refreshing to see Allen making a blithely happy film after wrestling with angst over the past few years; watching Allen play a dumb schlemiel is a treat that's been sorely missed. And in Ullman he's found a leading lady who can match him line for line; she wisely resists the urge to overplay Frenchy's crassness and comes up with a finely modulated characterization that makes her relationship with Ray the film's warm, heartfelt core. We'd almost forgotten Woody Allen could be this fun and goofy; it's good to see that part of him back in form. --Mark Englehart

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Funny and engaging, if not Woody's best, December 22, 2003

By	www.DavidLRattigan.com (United Kingdom) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Small Time Crooks (DVD)

This comedy caper is by no means among Woody Allen's best, nor the most consistently funny, but it nevertheless entertains. Allen and Ullmann manage to make the central characters warm enough to engage our affections.

Often it is said that Woody cannot do physical comedy, but there are some delightfully amusing moments herein that belie such a criticism, such as Woody's bungled attempts to sneak upstairs at a party to commit a robbery without being noticed.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hilarious!, December 14, 2000

By	Rodrigo Medina (Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro Brazil) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Small Time Crooks (DVD)

This is actually a great comedy of woody allen. I must confess I'm a fan of his movies, but I assure this is one you should not miss.

Woody plays an ex-con who decides to rob a bank. He tries to convince his wife, a manicurist, to spend their money buying an old street shop, so that he and his friends could dig a tunnel, which would supposedly lead them to a bank safety. In order to make it not suspicious, he asks her to sell cookies during the day.However, the cookies shop becomes very popular in the neighborhood and woody and his wife suddenly become noveau rich.

One year later, they are living a new life style, rounded by intelectuals, artists and socialites. In an effort to acquire some culture, the couple hires Hugh Grant to teach them good social manners, and this is the moment the film becomes hilarious. Woody was perfect, as always, playing a rude guy who'd rather watch TV eating chips than going to operas and museums. Besides woody, it's worth watching Elaine May, who plays a clueless cousin of woody's wife.

I also recommend you pay attention to woody's house decoration. In the living room, he had tigers, ancient objects and even an harp! Totally awesome!

This is a movie everyone should see! Inteligent and funny!

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Comedy By Woody Allen!, January 10, 2003

By	BookMania (Stafford, TX, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Small Time Crooks (DVD)

This movie is downright silly, and I loved every second of it! It's good to see Woody Allen writing, directing, and acting in a comedy movie. So much has been made about this man's personal life that people forget his professional talents.

Woody Allen and Tracy Ullman play a husband and wife in the style of Fred & Ethel Mertz of "I Love Lucy". They constantly bicker at each other, but it still remains an obviously loving relationship.

As the movie begins, Allen's character, Ray, is an ex-con who works as a dish washer, and Ullman plays his manicurist wife, Frenchy. They have exactly $6,000 between them, and they've decided to pool their money with other partners in order to execute a plan to rob a bank. They rent a storefront that neighbors the bank and plan on digging a tunnel from the store to inside the bank's vault. The storefront is turned into a cookie shop as a cover for their operation. The bank robbery idea goes sour, but ironically, the cookie shop flourishes, and the next thing you know, Ray and Frenchy are heading up their own giant cookie corporation. Frenchy decides that she'd like to join the ranks of the classy elite, so she buddies with an art dealer (played by Hugh Grant) and asks him to teach her how to live a lifestyle of affluence. Ray wants no part of this lifestyle, and his relationship with Frenchy begins to suffer. By the end of the movie, their cookie empire crumbles and Frenchy finds out that the art dealer is using her for her money, so Ray and Frenchy must come together again to salvage some money and escape to Florida.

All of this seems like alot to cram into a movie that's only 95 minutes long, but it all happens very fast, and in a very comical way. Woody Allen and Tracy Ullman are great in their roles, and the supporting cast complements them very nicely. This movie is a definite must-see.