‘The Old Man and the Gun’ is Classic Robert Redford (FILM REVIEW)

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Watching The Old Man & the Gun is something like watching a Robert Redford best of collection. A good one, too; one that was curated with attention and love, giving fans everything they love with a solid gathering of deeper cuts to appease a variety, luring in everyone. Moments of the film recall The Sting or Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, a small clip from The Chase, the 1966 film where Redford played an escaped convict, is used as Forrest Tucker recalls one of his own prison breaks, and, of course, The Old Man & the Gun features a plethora of that Redford charm, delivered, as always, with a smile that could melt the hardest heart.

Redford has been coy about whether or not this will be his last film—it is, it isn’t, it is, it might be, it probably is, we’ll see—but it’s for a sure a high note if he really does plan on hanging up his hat and walking away from acting. Not his highest note, certainly, but it serves well as a coda, giving us a final tussle with an actor who has charmed generations of film lovers and reminding us all why we loved him to begin with.

Whether it is or isn’t, it certainly feels like a final curtain call. Why else would writer/director David Lowery (Pete’s Dragon, A Ghost Story) work so hard to recall so many moments from his star’s career? There’s a knowing reverence to every frame of this movie—every frame featuring Redford, that is—which speaks to the knowledge that, yes, this will be his final hurrah. It’s all at once a letter of love and of goodbye.

Lowery adapts the New Yorker article of the same name from writer David Grann, which chronicles the baffling, almost lovable story of Tucker, a lifelong bank robber and multiple prison escapist, and the attempts to capture him. Tucker is a perfect American villain in that he seems ready made to be, well, adored. By all accounts he is charming and polite, the kind of guy you’d love to sit and chat with and who could make you feel like a million bucks. Sure, he’s a bank robber, but you can’t hold it against him. It’s just what he does for a living, and it’s a living he enjoys and, as an added bonus, happens to be pretty good at.

There’s a work ethic to his capers that makes him especially primed to be an American cult hero. He speaks clearly to that inner outlaw that we all have, the one that wonders how we might pull off a heist and whether or not we can get away with it, and reminds us, in that specifically Redfordian way, that we need not be an asshole just because we’re a criminal.

Everyone who comes into contact with Tucker seems to regard him as a gentlemen’s gentleman, not the least of which is Detective John Hunt (Casey Affleck) whose admiration for the thief grows the more he tries to capture him. Then there’s his new would be love interest, Jewel (Sissy Spacek) who finds herself getting lost in the boyish smile and manly charm. One gets the feeling that even his accomplices—played by Danny Glover and Tom Waits, forming a cinematic trio I never knew I needed until I got it—are under his spell, charmed as anyone.

Lowery infuses this all with a kind of old school charm that recalls the glory days of 70’s film. It’s a delicious throwback to a time when even the self-serious films were fun and filled with big named stars who charmed audiences with a smile and a wink. It’s kind of fluff, but it’s the best sort of fluff. It’s fluff with style and pizazz, fluff that isn’t content to settle for just the lowest common denominator. Fluff worthy not just of Redford, but worthy of being Redford’s final curtain call. Lowery, once again, has proven himself a filmmaker of singular talent and given us the perfect capstone for Redford’s career.

Well, at least maybe. Probably. We’ll see.

The Old Man & the Gun is now playing in limited release and will expand throughout the month.

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