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The Thomas Crown Affair

  • Title: The Thomas Crown Affair (1999)
  • IMDb: link

1999’s remake of the 1968 film about a multi-million dollar heist is certain an improvement on the original trading in a lackluster bank heist for stylish museum thefts of fine art. Casting Pierce Brosnan is the middle of his James Bond run as the bored rich man who steals art for his own amusement, the film never hits the Ocean’s 11 level of cool but it certainly has some cachet. Opposite our thief we get Rene Russo as the insurance investigator suspicious of Thomas Crown who also starts dating him (first for access but later feelings do develop as the pair consistently trade barbs).

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Quigley Down Under

  • Title: Quigley Down Under
  • IMDb: link

Tom Selleck stars as Wyoming sharpshooter Matthew Quigley who arrives in Australia having been hired by land baron Elliott Marston (Alan Rickman). After discovering Marston wants Quigley to use his skills, and his experimental rifle, to hunt Aboriginal Australians, Quigley not-so-politely declines leading to him being left for dead in the Outback with a half-crazed woman locals refer to as Crazy Cora (Laura San Giacomo) whom constantly refers to Quigley as Roy.

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Thunderball

  • Title: Thunderball
  • IMDb: link

Released 60 years ago, Thunderball was the fourth movie starring Sean Connery as James Bond and remains one of the most successful films of the entire Bond franchise earning back more than 15 times its budget at the box office. Featuring large underwater sequences, the film is notable for the deaths of several key members of SPECTRE (including one at his own funeral in the opening sequence).

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Killer Heat

  • Title: Killer Heat
  • IMDb: link

Killer Heat is a flaccid attempt at neo-noir starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a private detective hired by a widow (Shailene Woodley) to look into the death of her husband (Richard Madden). The film is also burdened with a subplot of the family life our private investigator fled from which haunts him (when convient to the script). Adapted from a Norwegian short story, I don’t know if something got lost in translation or if there just wasn’t much here to begin with.

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Aladdin

  • Title: Aladdin (1992)
  • IMDb: link

Released to critical and box office acclaim, although not without controversy for its depiction of Arab characters and culture, it’s easy to forget the success Disney’s Aladdin had given it would be soon eclipsed by The Lion King just two years later. While not the title character, it’s impossible not to begin with Robin Williams as the voice of the Genie. Despite the negative experience with working with Disney, Robin’s stream-of-consciousness comic style translated terrifically to an animated character (even if I could do without some of the more obvious Disney pop-culture references).

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