Juxtapositions, transitions, forced self-inventory, and car expositions are all meshed together for a simple cat and mouse film. The tropes are there, the sleek, handsome, rich jewel thief that no one knows is operating that is desperately lonely, and the weary, out of shape Detective, who’s love life is dissolving, is on his case while no one else believes him. Enticing subplots of the female office worker stuck below the glass ceiling, and jubilant solo  street criminal that is portrayed destined for  criminal life. The movie is city. It is urban. It is L.A. It is politically saturated, but never forced.  It’s almost fantastic. It is just good, solid filmmaking. 

Technically sound, the performances are stellar, it’s the script that leans to being too clunky at times, even though it is very polished. There are just enough awkward dialogue scenes that it takes me out for a bit but edited well enough to bring it back. With what is against the script The subplots are developed well and are very believable. Each character’s strength and weakness is shown through. Chris Hemsworth is right for the part of a thief knowing there isn’t really much fulfillment in his criminal enterprise and knows he is being used by others. And the counter is to him Mark Ruffalo, no stranger to playing detectives, is right playing the part of long in the tooth detective threatened to keep in line with the police and stay on their side.  

It will be unfairly compared to previous LA crime films, namely “Heat” but this film stands alone with other cat and mouse crime thrillers because mainly there is the premise that crime is almost subjective to the cause of justice. What is unique is that the thief, the detective, and the insurance adjuster each have passion to get out of their profession rather than singularly focused on their jobs. They all want out and believe breaking the law is the only way to achieve it. Each character must face the idea of breaking the law at some point to achieve what society refuses to provide them, wealth. Even though each character knows it will not provide happiness. 

There is a strong desire for a rewatch.  This film has that flavor that a rewatch will be required to get the full account of what it wants to convey. Overall, the strengths of films are its character and technique. What is truly missing is that it just didn’t have the punch at the end that would be required for its two hour long opus. If we had that great, sustaining ending it would have shot it up to be a great film- it just was almost made it  8/10