Search - Thieves Like Us

Released in the same 12-month span as Terrence Malick's Badlands (1973) and Steven Spielberg's The Sugarland Express (1974), Robert Altman's Thieves Like Us (1974) also tells a story of doomed outlaws in love. Depression-era criminals T-Dub (Bert Remsen), Chicamaw (John Schuck), and Bowie (Keith Carradine) band together to rob banks after escaping from a prison farm. Hiding out with Dee Mobley (Tom Skerritt) and Keechie (Shelley Duvall), and then with T-Dub's in-law Mattie (Louise Fletcher) between bank jobs, the three crooks are a loyal group, but increasingly sensational news accounts of their bloodless robberies force them to split up before their next crime. After a car accident, Chicamaw leaves the injured Bowie in Keechie's care. Love blossoms between the two naïfs, compelling Bowie to find a way to balance his bond to Keechie with his loyalty to his friends and the need for money to head for Mexico. With the law closing in, Bowie and Keechie learn the hard way about the finite honor among thieves, and the need to survive. Adapted from the same Edward Anderson novel as Nicholas Ray's They Live By Night (1949), Altman, writers Calder Willingham and Joan Tewkesbury, and Altman's acting "regulars" reworked not just the classical crime movie but also the 1967 hit Bonnie and Clyde, presenting a resolutely unglamorous portrait of this Coke-swilling outlaw couple and the survivors' stoic drive to carry on. With the radio providing soundtrack and commentary, and the newspapers sending a veiled warning, Bowie and Keechie cannot escape the outside world, but they also cannot transcend it into the realm of myth. Rather than turning the crimes into stylish exploits, Altman's camera remains outside most of the robberies, observing the banal action on the street; he saves the slow-motion in the climactic shoot-out for the witnesses rather than the dead. His zoom shots hover between fragments of emotion and place, while they maintain their observational distance. Unfortunately for Altman (and Malick and Spielberg), audiences preferred outlaw glamour to genre-bending introspection. Still, with its deceptively laid-back tone, eye for expressive detail, and ear for ironic juxtaposition, Thieves Like Us takes its place in Altman's exceptional body of early 1970s work. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide

Keith Carradine - Bowie
Shelley Duvall - Keechie
John Schuck - Chicamaw
Bert Remsen - T-Dub
Louise Fletcher - Mattie
Josephine Bennett
Walter Cooper
Lloyd Jones - Sheriffs
Howard Warner - Bank Hostages

Thieves Like Us is one of the best and most elusive of Robert Altman's great films of the 1970's, but MGM and 20th Century Fox Home Video have teamed up to finally give the film the American DVD release it has long deserved. Thieves Like Us has been given a widescreen transfer to disc, letterboxed at the 1.85:1 aspect ratio on conventional televisions and enhanced for anamorphic play on 16x9 monitors. The hazy beauty and muted color schemes of Jean Bofferty's cinematography have been captured beautifully on this disc, and it's a pleasure to watch. The original English language audio has been mastered in two mixes, one monophonic and one stereo (both have been mastered in Dolby Digital Stereo), while optional dubbed tracks in French and Spanish are in mono; the stereo mix flatters Altman's naturalistic sound mix best, but both have been transferred with care. The disc also includes optional subtitles in English and Spanish. As a bonus, this release also includes a commentary track by Robert Altman, apparently recorded in 1998 (judging from his comments, he was prepping Cookie's Fortune at the time), and while he doesn't strive to comment on every single detail on the movie, what he does say is usually interesting and enlightening. Thieves Like Us is a beautiful film ripe for rediscovery, and this release finally makes it available again in the United States in fine form; this is a must for fans of Altman's work or Seventies cinema in general. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

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S	Not Tonight Darling
2	Book of Numbers
2	Breaking Point (R)
3	Belle de Jour (R)
These movies have the subject or theme of Thieves Like Us...
S	Crime Wave/Decoy (NR)
S	Hangmen Also Die
4	Passage to Marseille (NR)
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2	A Slight Case of Murder (NR)
S	Barbara Loden's Wanda
S	Revved (R)
1	The Trial
S	Murder, Inc. (NR)
1	American Heart (R)
1	Woman on the Run
18	Romper Stomper [Special Edition] (NR)
1	The Valachi Papers (PG)
S	Somewhere in the Night (PG)
These movies share cast/crew with Thieves Like Us...
6	Nashville (R)
8	The Player (R)
2	3 Women [Criterion Collection] (PG)
2	McCabe & Mrs. Miller (R)
42	M*A*S*H (R)
S	The Nasty Rabbit
2	A Wedding (PG)
2	Aria (R)
3	Fuzz (PG)
10	Short Cuts (R)
1	Robert Altman Collection
2	The Long Goodbye (R)
2	The Lady in Red (R)
38	Dick Tracy (PG)
These movies cover the same subjects as Thieves Like Us...
2	The Long Goodbye (R)
2	McCabe & Mrs. Miller (R)
1	California Split (R)
These movies are similar to Thieves Like Us...
3	Badlands (PG)
28	Bonnie and Clyde
9	Breathless (R)
9	The Postman Always Rings Twice (R)
5	The Sugarland Express (PG)
23	The Newton Boys (PG-13)
10	Lonely Hearts (R)
These movies are original versions of Thieves Like Us...
3	They Live by Night/Side Street (NR)