Sneakers | | Cast : | Robert Redford, Sidney Poitier, Dan Aykroyd | | Director : | Phil Alden Robinson | | Studio : | Universal Studios | | Format : | Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen | | Released Date : | September 09, 1992 | | DVD Released Date : | December 28, 2004 | | Language : | Spanish (Dubbed), French (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Original Language), French (Original Language) | | Audience Rating : | PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | August 04, 2005 | | Summary | Sneak away | Content
 | I thought so in the 90s and i still do in 05...this is one of my favourite movies of the previous decade...absolutely great. Entertainment for the entire family...PG 13 of course. |
| Rating | | | Date | June 14, 2005 | | Summary | One of Redfords better jobs | Content
| A great film that captures the start of the dot com period of history. With a twist to the story that pays homage to some of the urban legends that are running around. Altogether a good story with a cast that knows what they are doing and are enjoying themselves while doing it. |
| Rating | | | Date | April 05, 2005 | | Summary | THIS ISN'T ABOUT A RUNNING MAN!!! OR IS IT? | Content
| SNEAKERS is such a polite film, with its concentration on its cast and its seemingly hopeless obstacle overshadowing hot action scenes or torrid love scenes. Written and directed by FIELD OF DREAMS Phil Alden Robinson, this movie charms with its array of colorful characters and the cast's obvious understanding of what they were intended to do. A then middle-aged Robert Redford, still maintaining that boyish handsomeness, has a field day as Martin Bishop, a man who has been on the run since avoiding capture in an earlier computer hacking scam. His crew of "sneakers" includes Sidney Poitier, Dan Aykroyd, River Phoenix and the marvelous David Strathairn. Mary McDonnell from DANCES WITH WOLVES is also along for the ride, and she is a joyful addition to the cast. Ben Kingsley shows up as the real villain, and we even get THIRTY SOMETHINGS Timothy Busfield as one of the villains. The ubiquitous James Earl Jones shows up for the climax which is hilarious as each team member tells him what they want from him before they give him the valued box. SNEAKERS is smart, witty and suspenseful, and is a wonderful little film that should have gotten more notice when released. Maybe DVD fans will latch on to this one and make it more appreciated. |
| Rating | | | Date | January 10, 2005 | | Summary | "Cattle mutilations are up." | Content
| That first time I used my credit card to buy something online, I did so with quite a bit of trepidation, as I had concerns about how easily some hacker type could steal my card number and rack up my debt...since then I've realized many sites do utilize some sort of protection against that kind of thing, but still, the thought of vulnerabilities lingers in my mind...and movies like Sneakers (1992) certainly don't help to quell those concerns...written and directed by Phil Alden Robinson (Field of Dreams), the film stars Robert Redford (Three Days of the Condor) and Sidney Poitier (Guess Who's Coming to Dinner). Also appearing is David Strathairn (Dolores Claiborne), Dan Aykroyd (Grosse Pointe Blank), the late River Phoenix (My Own Private Idaho), Mary McDonnell (Independence Day), and Ben Kingsley (Gandhi).
In the film, Martin Bishop (Redford) and his colleagues operate a security company who other businesses hire to break into their companies, exposing where their security may be lacking. Each member of the small team has their own, unique background (many involving past criminal activities), but after the group is approached (blackmailed) by a gooberment agency with a proposition to recover a mysterious device (it involves the use of computers and cryptography), it's discovered that Bishop has the most to lose if they don't accept the job. The group manages the acquisition easy enough, but soon find themselves in a heap of trouble as the device turns out to be something of extreme value, a device many would kill to possess. As the web of conspiracy and deceit grows, as does the level of danger (various individuals wind up getting killed), the group must use all their abilities to outwit those intent on stealing the device for themselves, using it for their own, nefarious purposes, and seeing Martin and his co-workers in jail, or even dead.
Sneakers is a deceptive film. I've seen it a few times, the first time I saw it, it appeared to be a light movie (I've read that the makers of the film injected a modest amount of profanity into the script to avoid a `G' rating, for fears the movie would have been perceived as a film for children) with a few, gaping plot holes, but subsequent viewings (for me, at least), reveal it to be a very rich, complex, intelligent, enjoyable thriller with an excellent cast and a tight storyline with little or no mistakes, and the plot holes I originally perceived actually dealt with, many times in very subtle ways, hence the need for repeat viewings (it's important to pay attention to many of the little details provided throughout). Redford and Poitier are the strongest cast members in the film, but they don't necessarily come off that way, as they seem to understand the importance of their parts within the whole of the film, instilling a subtleness within their performances, allowing for the focus to be on the story rather on themselves. This seems to be an obvious sign of their experience, and I found myself appreciating this, as often starring actors tend to be full of themselves, and their efforts on screen show it...originally it seemed to me that the character development was a bit light, but I've since come to feel we're given just exactly what's needed for the story, and anymore would have bordered on the extraneous and unnecessary. Also, it's nice to see a film where Dan Aykroyd plays a relatively minor part, doing what he's told, having nothing to do with the writing or directing (he not only wrote but directed the one of the worst films I've ever seen in 1991's Nothing But Trouble). Also, I usually tend to like women with the longer hair, but I thought Mary McDonnell, with her short hair and all, looked very attractive and added a wonderful, feminine element to this nearly all male cast with her role as Liz, a former lover of Bishop, now assisting the group seemingly out of appreciation of Bishop's past. Director Robinson keeps the pacing tight, and uses the talent within the film well (I supposed this is helped by the fact he also wrote the screenplay, so he has an intimate understanding of the visuals he wants to present in accordance with the story). The McGuffin (a term invented by Alfred Hitchcock to describe the element of the film the plot centers on...he would often present, but rarely elaborate on it, as its' specifics were never important, in his mind, only its' use in providing focus for the story and progressing the plot) seems a bit farfetched, but the smart story and the talented performances do well in creating a level of believability that got through this aspect. Another important feature of the film is the musical score, provided by legendary and prolific composer James Horner (Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan, Aliens). Usually I neglect mentioning the music within a film unless it's either really bad or really good (the latter being the case here). I wonder how many people are aware that he started out composing for low budget producer Roger Corman, working on films like Battle Beyond the Stars and Humanoids From the Deep, both released 1980. A couple of minor appearances worth looking for are Donal Logue (Blade, The Tao of Steve), James Earl Jones (Clear and Present Danger), and Timothy Busfield (Revenge of the Nerds). Favorite line from the film? When Bishop is talking to the NSA guys and responds, "I could have been in the NSA, but they found out my parents were married."
The widescreen anamorphic picture (1.85:1) looks reasonably fair, and the Dolby Digital Surround 2.0 tracks (available in English, French, and Spanish) sound decent. Special features include an original theatrical trailer for the film, subtitles, informative production notes, background and filmographies of some of the cast and crew, a `making of' featurette, and commentary track by the director. All in all a decent release of a really good film.
Cookieman108
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| Rating | | | Date | December 17, 2004 | | Summary | "Sneaking" Around | Content
| Robert Redford and Sidney Poitier head a fine cast in SNEAKERS, a solid 1992 thriller with a robust sense of humor directed and co-written with good skill by Phil Alden Robinson (FIELD OF DREAMS). In it, Redford, who has been on the run since 1969 for computer hacking in that politically turbulent time, heads up a team of security experts known as "sneakers", whose job it is to penetrate the security set-ups of their respective clients to give them tips whenever those companies' security systems are lacking. Then two guys (Timothy Busfield; Eddie Jones) claiming to be from the National Security Agency give Redford the biggest task of all: to recover a "little black box" from a Czech scientist visiting in the San Francisco Bay Area.
But when they find out what this little black box does, they realize that they could be marked for death. For this box is actually a machine that can break any security codes to every single system on the planet. And when Busfield and Jones turn out NOT to be NSA representatives and renege on the arrangement they made with him, Redford is forced to confront an old friend (Ben Kingsley) from his past who is now out to take revenge.
Structured with elements of techno-thrillers, spy thrillers, and fears of Big Brother, and combined with goodly amounts of humor, SNEAKERS moves quite briskly through its 125-minute running time. Suspenseful moments, including Redford having to move ultra-slowly through a highly secured area to recover the box in Kingsley's complex, are juxtaposed with moments of political humor, including Dan Aykroyd's conspiracy-obsessed technician, and in the film's introductory scene, in which the younger versions of Redford and Kingsley think of transfering the money in Richard Nixon's personal checking account to the National Association to Legalize Marijuana. As rightly mentioned in Amazon's review of the film, that little black box that can break every code functions as what Hitchcock calls a "McGuffin", a plot device that may not mean much to us until we realize why people want it so badly they'd kill for it. This, combined with fears of the government functioning as "Big Brother", make SNEAKERS every bit as relevant today as when it was released in 1992, perhaps even more so. |
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