Sneakers

Running Time: 126 minutes.
Media: DVD.

This was an old favorite of mine, I first saw this back in Year 11 when I was in my Computer Studies class back in school as part of a study in cryptography.

The movie involves the lives of Martin Bishop (played by the illustrious Robert Redford), a security systems consultant, and other fellow members of his "club", Dan Aykroyd, Sidney Poitier, River Phoenix and David Strathairn. In the attempt to recover a code-breaker, Bishop and his renegade "sneakers" get involved with the likes of Bishop's old friend Cosmo, who wound up in jail after being bagged for hacking university networks... Seems Marty had gone out to get pizza.

Further delving into the plan to retrieve, and then to re-retrieve the code-breaker result in both technical and comic incidences by the sneakers that pepper the film appropriately. Keep watch for the scene towards the end of the film involving a blind Whistler (played by Strathairn) driving the getaway van... always brings a smile to my face!

"Sneakers" differs from many other more recent caper films in the sense that the tension seems to be more focused on the action, and the music which coincides with the action makes the film all the worthwhile. Ben Kingsley's portrayal of Cosmo pushes the villain card even further, and it off-sets Martin's good-guy persona very well.

With twist after twist throughout the film, this movie has derived a  bit of a cult status, with Rotten Tomatoes giving it a rating of 81% with an average score of 6.8 out of 10. I'm personally giving it 4 stars, only because it's a little... schmaltzy after looking at it some 19 years later... but it's nevertheless a favorite of mine.