The Town (2010 film)
Encyclopedia
The Town is a 2010 crime film
starring, co-written, and directed by Ben Affleck
adapted from Chuck Hogan
's novel Prince of Thieves. The film opened in theaters in the United States on September 17, 2010 at number one with more than $23 million and positive reviews. Jeremy Renner
was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as James "Jem" Coughlin.
The film is one of a number set in Boston
, Massachusetts
, over the past decade that have formed a "sub-genre" of crime films, including Affleck's own 2007 film Gone Baby Gone
.
neighborhood of Charlestown—Doug MacRay (Ben Affleck
), James "Jem" Coughlin (Jeremy Renner
), Albert "Gloansy" Magloan (Slaine
), and Desmond "Dez" Elden (Owen Burke)—rob a bank, taking its manager, Claire Keesey (Rebecca Hall
), hostage. After escaping capture, the gang releases Claire, who has seen a distinctive tattoo on one of the robbers. Doug later follows Claire and pretends to befriend her to get information from her about the investigation, but the two become involved and a relationship begins, unbeknownst to the gang, including Doug's best friend Jem, who bears the incriminating tattoo. Doug tells Claire of his search for his long-lost mother, and how he blew his chance to be a professional hockey player for a life of crime. When Claire tells him about her knowledge of the tattoo, Doug feigns concern for Claire's safety and convinces her not to tell police about it, while gradually becoming disenchanted with his criminal lifestyle.
FBI Special Agent Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) surveils the gang and learns that they work for local florist and crime lord Fergus "Fergie" Colm (Pete Postlethwaite
), who has another robbery set up for the gang. During a visit to his father, Stephen (Chris Cooper
), in prison, Doug reveals his plans to leave Charlestown and go to Florida. Stephen ends the visit by telling his son, "I'll see you again, this side or the other." Doug reluctantly agrees to pull off the robbery in the North End of Boston, where gunfire erupts. The police give chase, and the gang barely escapes. Later, Frawley interrogates each of them, but fails to get a confession and is forced to release them. When Claire quits her job, Frawley learns of her relationship with Doug and confronts her. Claire, who is shocked to learn that Doug is one of the men who kidnapped her, is suspected by Frawley of being an accomplice, but Claire eventually agrees to help him catch Doug.
Jem relays plans of another of Fergie's heists to Doug, who refuses, even though Jem had, in the past, killed a man who was going to kill Doug. After Fergie tells Doug he will kill Claire if he doesn't agree to the job, Doug relents but threatens to kill Fergie if Claire is harmed. While preparing for the job, Jem tells Doug he is ready to shoot it out with police instead of going back to prison.
At Fenway Park
, Doug and Jem enter disguised as Boston police
officers, trick the guards, gain entrance into the money room, and steal $3 million in cash. They prepare to make their getaway in an ambulance, disguised as paramedics, unaware that Frawley has coerced Doug's ex-girlfriend, Krista (Blake Lively
) into revealing details of the heist by threatening to keep her from her daughter. Surrounded by police and caught in a firefight with SWAT
, Dez and Gloansy are killed while Doug and Jem slip away in their police uniforms. Frawley figures out the ruse and spots Jem, who fires at Frawley, but is cornered by police. Wounded, out of ammunition and determined not to go back to prison, Jem rushes toward the police with his weapons drawn and is immediately gunned down
. Doug witnesses the killing of his best friend but manages to evade capture.
Returning to Fergie's flower shop, Doug kills Fergie and his bodyguard and calls Claire to ask her to come away with him to Florida. Secretly watching from across the street, Doug sees the FBI are with Claire, who at first tells him to come pick her up, but eventually gives him a coded message to warn him away. Doug flees, donning a bus driver's uniform and escaping from Boston in a stolen bus and later by train, eventually making it to Florida
. Later, Claire finds a bag buried by Doug in her community garden containing money, a tangerine and a note from him telling her he has left town. Claire donates the money, in the name of Doug's mother, for refurbishment of a local ice-hockey arena that Doug, once a promising hockey player, had played in. The note ends with the words "I'll see you again, this side or the other."
. The former MASSBank branch located in Melrose, Massachusetts
, was used as the location for the first robbery of the film, taking on the name Cambridge Merchants Bank (the exterior shots, however, are of Cambridge Savings Bank in Harvard Square). Filming also took place at Mohegan Sun
in Uncasville, Connecticut
, for casino scenes, Massachusetts Correctional Institution – Cedar Junction in Walpole, Massachusetts
, for use of their visiting room, and Woburn, Massachusetts
, own Anderson Regional Transportation Center
for the ending Amtrak scenes.
and premiered at Boston's Fenway Park
. The film was released in the United States on September 17, 2010.
and DVD
on . Both versions include special features and commentary including a look at Affleck as a director and actor. The extended/unrated version is a Blu-ray/DVD/Digital Copy bundle which includes 28 minutes of additional footage, taking the runtime to over 153 minutes.
reports that 94% of 208 critics have given the film a positive review, with a rating average of 7.7 out of 10. The site describes the film as "tense, smartly written, and wonderfully cast". Metacritic
, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gives the film a score of 74 based on 42 reviews.
Roger Ebert
gave the film 3 out of 4 stars, praising Jeremy Renner's performance and Affleck's direction. Several reviewers praised the film's action sequences. In his review for The New York Times
, A. O. Scott
commented on the opening heist, "That sequence, like most of the other action set pieces in the film, is lean, brutal and efficient, and evidence of Mr. Affleck’s skill and self-confidence as a director." Brooks, in The Guardian
, wrote that the action sequences were "sharply orchestrated" but added "it's a bogus, bull-headed enterprise all the same; a film that leaves no cliche untrampled." Justin Chang wrote in Variety
that the action scenes strike "an ideal balance between kineticism and clarity" aided by cinematographer Robert Elswit
and film editor Dylan Tichenor
. Richard Roeper
of the Chicago Sun Times gave the film an A+, noting that he found the film incredibly similar to Michael Mann's Heat, which he described as "one of [his] favorite movies of all time." The reviewers at Spill.com
also praised one of the shootout scenes, saying "It is surely the best shootout scene we have seen in decades." Writing in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Laremy Lengel titled his review "The Town Works Best if You Avoid the Heat," also referencing Mann's film.
As a Boston-based crime drama, the film forms part of a "crime-movie subgenre" typically marked by "flavorsome accents, pungent atmosphere and fatalistic undertow," according to Chang. Within that subgenre, which includes The Boondock Saints
, The Departed
, Mystic River
and Affleck's Gone Baby Gone
, The Town is more of a straightforward crime-procedural and has a more optimistic outlook.
Also, Jeremy Renner
has received nominations for Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture, Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor
. Pete Postlethwaite
has posthumously been nominated for a BAFTA
for Best Supporting Actor. The film has also received several Satellite Award nominations for Renner, Affleck as director, film editing, adapted screenplay, and best motion picture drama.
The film itself, however, only states that "One blue-collar Boston neighborhood has produced more bank robbers and armored car theives than anywhere in the world." It then quotes an unnamed Boston Robbery Task Force Federal Agent as saying, "Bank robbery became like a trade in Charlestown, passed down from father to son." During the film, Agent Frawley says something very similar along the lines of this quote while conversing with Claire, and also mentions that the traditional procedure of the BPD whenever a call about an armored car robbery comes in is to close the Charlestown Bridge
.
The film also ends with a written disclaimer: "Charlestown's reputation as a breeding ground for armed robbers is authentic. However, this film all but ignores the great majority of the residents of Charlestown, past and present, who are the same good and true people found most anywhere."
According to a September 2010 article in The Boston Globe
, Charlestown was once known as an area where bank robbers were concentrated, but has not been since the mid-1990s, and the subject has been a sore point for "Townies". Now much of the neighborhood has been gentrified
. There is some sense of rivalry between Townies, people who lived in the historically Irish-Catholic neighborhood for decades, and "Tunies", largely white-collar workers who arrived with gentrification, but most of that has died down, the newspaper reports. http://www.boston.com/yourtown/boston/charlestown/articles/2010/09/18/afflecks_new_film_is_the_talk_of_the_townies/ The film makes reference to the definition of "Tunies" during one of Doug and Claire's dates.
In the early 1990s, an increase in the number of bank and armored car robberies by Townies focused attention on Charlestown. In one heist in Hudson, New Hampshire, two guards were killed, and is alluded to in the film - during a scene where Agent Frawley is briefing his task force, he mentions that Doug's father is serving life for a notable armored car robbery in Nashwood. According to Frawley, he hijacked a bread truck up to New Hampshire, and when one of the guards saw his face, he executed both of them with their own weapons (Frawley notes that this incident led to the passing of regulations prohibiting the driver from leaving the cab even if their partner was being held at gunpoint). Charles Hogan got the idea for his novel, on which the film is based, in 1995. "It was just so remarkable that this one very small community was the focus for bank robbers," he said, but he was very aware that crime was only one part of the community, and he did not want to make all residents of the neighborhood look like criminals. At the film's premiere, Affleck made a similar statement: "Charlestown isn’t full of bank robbers and Dorchester isn’t full of bad guys and Southie isn’t full of math geniuses
or bad people."
Jack O'Callahan
, a Charlestown native born in 1957, said there was an element of crime in Charlestown when he grew up there, "But it didn't bleed into the neighborhood. And those guys were pretty good parents who went to church on Sundays. They were gangsters, but they were good neighbors."
Crime film
Crime films are films which focus on the lives of criminals. The stylistic approach to a crime film varies from realistic portrayals of real-life criminal figures, to the far-fetched evil doings of imaginary arch-villains. Criminal acts are almost always glorified in these movies.- Plays and films...
starring, co-written, and directed by Ben Affleck
Ben Affleck
Benjamin Géza Affleck-Boldt , better known as Ben Affleck, is an American actor, film director, writer, and producer. He became known with his performances in Kevin Smith's films such as Mallrats and Chasing Amy...
adapted from Chuck Hogan
Chuck Hogan
Chuck Hogan is an American author. He is the author of Prince of Thieves: A Novel, a work upon which Ben Affleck's Academy Award-nominated film The Town is based on. The work won the 2005 Hammett Prize and was called one of the ten best novels of the year by Stephen King...
's novel Prince of Thieves. The film opened in theaters in the United States on September 17, 2010 at number one with more than $23 million and positive reviews. Jeremy Renner
Jeremy Renner
Jeremy Lee Renner is a two-time Academy-Award-nominated American actor and musician. Renner appeared in films throughout the 2000s, mostly in supporting roles. He came to prominence in films such as Dahmer , S.W.A.T. , Neo Ned , 28 Weeks Later and The Hurt Locker...
was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as James "Jem" Coughlin.
The film is one of a number set in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
, Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
, over the past decade that have formed a "sub-genre" of crime films, including Affleck's own 2007 film Gone Baby Gone
Gone Baby Gone
Gone Baby Gone is a 2007 American crime drama-mystery film directed by Ben Affleck and starring his brother Casey Affleck. The screenplay by Ben Affleck and Aaron Stockard is based on the novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane, author of Mystic River and Shutter Island...
.
Plot
Four lifelong friends from the dangerous streets of the BostonBoston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
neighborhood of Charlestown—Doug MacRay (Ben Affleck
Ben Affleck
Benjamin Géza Affleck-Boldt , better known as Ben Affleck, is an American actor, film director, writer, and producer. He became known with his performances in Kevin Smith's films such as Mallrats and Chasing Amy...
), James "Jem" Coughlin (Jeremy Renner
Jeremy Renner
Jeremy Lee Renner is a two-time Academy-Award-nominated American actor and musician. Renner appeared in films throughout the 2000s, mostly in supporting roles. He came to prominence in films such as Dahmer , S.W.A.T. , Neo Ned , 28 Weeks Later and The Hurt Locker...
), Albert "Gloansy" Magloan (Slaine
Slaine (rapper)
George Carroll, born 1977 in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, and better known as Slaine, is an Irish-American hip hop MC and actor. He is best known for his work in the groups Special Teamz and La Coka Nostra .Slaine has appeared on several solo mixtapes and...
), and Desmond "Dez" Elden (Owen Burke)—rob a bank, taking its manager, Claire Keesey (Rebecca Hall
Rebecca Hall
Rebecca Maria Hall is an English actress.In 2003, Hall won the Ian Charleson Award for her debut stage performance in a production of Mrs. Warren's Profession...
), hostage. After escaping capture, the gang releases Claire, who has seen a distinctive tattoo on one of the robbers. Doug later follows Claire and pretends to befriend her to get information from her about the investigation, but the two become involved and a relationship begins, unbeknownst to the gang, including Doug's best friend Jem, who bears the incriminating tattoo. Doug tells Claire of his search for his long-lost mother, and how he blew his chance to be a professional hockey player for a life of crime. When Claire tells him about her knowledge of the tattoo, Doug feigns concern for Claire's safety and convinces her not to tell police about it, while gradually becoming disenchanted with his criminal lifestyle.
FBI Special Agent Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) surveils the gang and learns that they work for local florist and crime lord Fergus "Fergie" Colm (Pete Postlethwaite
Pete Postlethwaite
Peter William "Pete" Postlethwaite, OBE, was an English stage, film and television actor.After minor television appearances including in The Professionals, Postlethwaite's first success came with the film Distant Voices, Still Lives in 1988. He played a mysterious lawyer, Mr...
), who has another robbery set up for the gang. During a visit to his father, Stephen (Chris Cooper
Chris Cooper (actor)
Christopher W. "Chris" Cooper is an American film actor. He became well known in the late 1990s. He has appeared in supporting performances in several major Hollywood films, including The Bourne Identity, American Beauty, Capote, The Town, The Kingdom, Syriana, October Sky, Seabiscuit, and...
), in prison, Doug reveals his plans to leave Charlestown and go to Florida. Stephen ends the visit by telling his son, "I'll see you again, this side or the other." Doug reluctantly agrees to pull off the robbery in the North End of Boston, where gunfire erupts. The police give chase, and the gang barely escapes. Later, Frawley interrogates each of them, but fails to get a confession and is forced to release them. When Claire quits her job, Frawley learns of her relationship with Doug and confronts her. Claire, who is shocked to learn that Doug is one of the men who kidnapped her, is suspected by Frawley of being an accomplice, but Claire eventually agrees to help him catch Doug.
Jem relays plans of another of Fergie's heists to Doug, who refuses, even though Jem had, in the past, killed a man who was going to kill Doug. After Fergie tells Doug he will kill Claire if he doesn't agree to the job, Doug relents but threatens to kill Fergie if Claire is harmed. While preparing for the job, Jem tells Doug he is ready to shoot it out with police instead of going back to prison.
At Fenway Park
Fenway Park
Fenway Park is a baseball park near Kenmore Square in Boston, Massachusetts. Located at 4 Yawkey Way, it has served as the home ballpark of the Boston Red Sox baseball club since it opened in 1912, and is the oldest Major League Baseball stadium currently in use. It is one of two "classic"...
, Doug and Jem enter disguised as Boston police
Boston Police Department
The Boston Police Department , created in 1838, holds the primary responsibility for law enforcement and investigation within the city of Boston, Massachusetts. It is one of the oldest police departments in the United States...
officers, trick the guards, gain entrance into the money room, and steal $3 million in cash. They prepare to make their getaway in an ambulance, disguised as paramedics, unaware that Frawley has coerced Doug's ex-girlfriend, Krista (Blake Lively
Blake Lively
Blake Christina Lively is an American actress and model who stars as Serena van der Woodsen in the television teen drama series Gossip Girl...
) into revealing details of the heist by threatening to keep her from her daughter. Surrounded by police and caught in a firefight with SWAT
SWAT
A SWAT team is an elite tactical unit in various national law enforcement departments. They are trained to perform high-risk operations that fall outside of the abilities of regular officers...
, Dez and Gloansy are killed while Doug and Jem slip away in their police uniforms. Frawley figures out the ruse and spots Jem, who fires at Frawley, but is cornered by police. Wounded, out of ammunition and determined not to go back to prison, Jem rushes toward the police with his weapons drawn and is immediately gunned down
Suicide by cop
Suicide by cop is a suicide method in which a suicidal individual deliberately acts in a threatening way, with the goal of provoking a lethal response from a law enforcement officer or other armed individual, such as being shot to death....
. Doug witnesses the killing of his best friend but manages to evade capture.
Returning to Fergie's flower shop, Doug kills Fergie and his bodyguard and calls Claire to ask her to come away with him to Florida. Secretly watching from across the street, Doug sees the FBI are with Claire, who at first tells him to come pick her up, but eventually gives him a coded message to warn him away. Doug flees, donning a bus driver's uniform and escaping from Boston in a stolen bus and later by train, eventually making it to Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
. Later, Claire finds a bag buried by Doug in her community garden containing money, a tangerine and a note from him telling her he has left town. Claire donates the money, in the name of Doug's mother, for refurbishment of a local ice-hockey arena that Doug, once a promising hockey player, had played in. The note ends with the words "I'll see you again, this side or the other."
Cast
- Ben AffleckBen AffleckBenjamin Géza Affleck-Boldt , better known as Ben Affleck, is an American actor, film director, writer, and producer. He became known with his performances in Kevin Smith's films such as Mallrats and Chasing Amy...
as Douglas "Doug" MacRay, a career criminal and professional bank robber. - Jon Hamm as Special Agent Adam Frawley, an FBI agent pursuing the team of criminals.
- Rebecca HallRebecca HallRebecca Maria Hall is an English actress.In 2003, Hall won the Ian Charleson Award for her debut stage performance in a production of Mrs. Warren's Profession...
as Claire Keesey, a bank manager who falls in love with Doug. - Jeremy RennerJeremy RennerJeremy Lee Renner is a two-time Academy-Award-nominated American actor and musician. Renner appeared in films throughout the 2000s, mostly in supporting roles. He came to prominence in films such as Dahmer , S.W.A.T. , Neo Ned , 28 Weeks Later and The Hurt Locker...
as James "Jem" Coughlin, Doug's best friend and a member of Doug's team. - Blake LivelyBlake LivelyBlake Christina Lively is an American actress and model who stars as Serena van der Woodsen in the television teen drama series Gossip Girl...
as Krista Coughlin, Jem's sister and Doug's ex-girlfriend who has a 19-month-old daughter, Shyne. - Chris CooperChris Cooper (actor)Christopher W. "Chris" Cooper is an American film actor. He became well known in the late 1990s. He has appeared in supporting performances in several major Hollywood films, including The Bourne Identity, American Beauty, Capote, The Town, The Kingdom, Syriana, October Sky, Seabiscuit, and...
as Stephen MacRay, Doug's incarcerated father. - SlaineSlaine (rapper)George Carroll, born 1977 in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, and better known as Slaine, is an Irish-American hip hop MC and actor. He is best known for his work in the groups Special Teamz and La Coka Nostra .Slaine has appeared on several solo mixtapes and...
as Albert "Gloansy" Magloan, a member of Doug's team. - Titus WelliverTitus WelliverTitus Welliver is an American actor. He is best known for his recurring roles on the television shows Deadwood, Lost, Sons of Anarchy and The Good Wife...
as Special Agent Dino Ciampa, Adam Frawley's partner. - Pete PostlethwaitePete PostlethwaitePeter William "Pete" Postlethwaite, OBE, was an English stage, film and television actor.After minor television appearances including in The Professionals, Postlethwaite's first success came with the film Distant Voices, Still Lives in 1988. He played a mysterious lawyer, Mr...
as Fergus "Fergie" Colm, the owner of a flower shop and the local crime boss. - Owen Burke as Desmond "Dez" Elden, a member of Doug's team, and a systems technician at a cable company called Vericom.
Production
The production began filming late August 2009 in BostonBoston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
. The former MASSBank branch located in Melrose, Massachusetts
Melrose, Massachusetts
-Government:Robert J. Dolan is the mayor. Melrose is represented in the Massachusetts House of Representatives by Paul Brodeur . Katherine Clark is the state senator for wards 1 through 5 and Thomas McGee is the state senator for wards 6 and 7. Melrose is part of the seventh Congressional...
, was used as the location for the first robbery of the film, taking on the name Cambridge Merchants Bank (the exterior shots, however, are of Cambridge Savings Bank in Harvard Square). Filming also took place at Mohegan Sun
Mohegan Sun
Mohegan Sun, located in Uncasville, Connecticut, is the second largest casino in the United States with of gaming space. It is located on along the banks of the Thames River. It is at the heart of the scenic foothills of southeastern Connecticut, where 60 percent of the state's tourism is...
in Uncasville, Connecticut
Montville, Connecticut
Montville is a town in New London County, Connecticut, United States. The population was 18,546 at the 2000 census and 19,571 at the 2010 census....
, for casino scenes, Massachusetts Correctional Institution – Cedar Junction in Walpole, Massachusetts
Walpole, Massachusetts
Walpole is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. It is located about south of Boston and north of Providence, Rhode Island. The population was 24,070 at the 2010 census. Walpole was first settled in 1659 and was considered a part of Dedham until officially incorporated in 1724...
, for use of their visiting room, and Woburn, Massachusetts
Woburn, Massachusetts
Woburn is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, USA. The population was 38,120 at the 2010 census. Woburn is located north of Boston, Massachusetts, and just south of the intersection of I-93 and I-95.- History :...
, own Anderson Regional Transportation Center
Anderson Regional Transportation Center
Anderson Regional Transportation Center is a train and bus station located at 100 Atlantic Ave., off Commerce Way in Woburn, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. It can be accessed from Exit 37C off Interstate 93 or the Washington Street exit off Interstate 95/Route 128. It opened on April 28, 2001,...
for the ending Amtrak scenes.
Release
The Town was shown at the Venice Film FestivalVenice Film Festival
The Venice International Film Festival is the oldest international film festival in the world. Founded by Count Giuseppe Volpi in 1932 as the "Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica", the festival has since taken place every year in late August or early September on the island of the...
and premiered at Boston's Fenway Park
Fenway Park
Fenway Park is a baseball park near Kenmore Square in Boston, Massachusetts. Located at 4 Yawkey Way, it has served as the home ballpark of the Boston Red Sox baseball club since it opened in 1912, and is the oldest Major League Baseball stadium currently in use. It is one of two "classic"...
. The film was released in the United States on September 17, 2010.
Box office
The film took first place at the box office during its opening weekend, taking in $23.8 million. The Town grossed $92.1 million in the United States and Canada with an additional $61.8 million in other territories for a total of $154 million worldwide on a production budget of $37 million.Home media
The film was released on Blu-ray discBlu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
and DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
on . Both versions include special features and commentary including a look at Affleck as a director and actor. The extended/unrated version is a Blu-ray/DVD/Digital Copy bundle which includes 28 minutes of additional footage, taking the runtime to over 153 minutes.
Critical reviews
The Town has received critical acclaim. Review aggregator Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
reports that 94% of 208 critics have given the film a positive review, with a rating average of 7.7 out of 10. The site describes the film as "tense, smartly written, and wonderfully cast". Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gives the film a score of 74 based on 42 reviews.
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
gave the film 3 out of 4 stars, praising Jeremy Renner's performance and Affleck's direction. Several reviewers praised the film's action sequences. In his review for The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, A. O. Scott
A. O. Scott
Anthony Oliver Scott, known as A. O. Scott , is an American journalist and critic. He is a chief film critic for The New York Times, along with Manohla Dargis.-Background and education:...
commented on the opening heist, "That sequence, like most of the other action set pieces in the film, is lean, brutal and efficient, and evidence of Mr. Affleck’s skill and self-confidence as a director." Brooks, in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, wrote that the action sequences were "sharply orchestrated" but added "it's a bogus, bull-headed enterprise all the same; a film that leaves no cliche untrampled." Justin Chang wrote in Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
that the action scenes strike "an ideal balance between kineticism and clarity" aided by cinematographer Robert Elswit
Robert Elswit
Robert Christopher Elswit, ASC is an American cinematographer. He has had multiple Oscar, BAFTA, and Independent Spirit nominations for several films, including There Will Be Blood. Elswit frequently works with director Paul Thomas Anderson.Elswit is a fierce defender of shooting with film, and...
and film editor Dylan Tichenor
Dylan Tichenor
Dylan Tichenor is a film editor.As a child, he grew up watching movies with his father. He graduated from Philadelphia's Central High School in 1986....
. Richard Roeper
Richard Roeper
Richard E. Roeper is an American columnist and film critic for The Chicago Sun-Times and now a co-host on The Roe Conn Show on WLS-AM...
of the Chicago Sun Times gave the film an A+, noting that he found the film incredibly similar to Michael Mann's Heat, which he described as "one of [his] favorite movies of all time." The reviewers at Spill.com
Spill.com
Spill.com is an award-winning video game and movie review, discussion, and news website created by cartoonist and animator Korey Coleman. It is the continuation of the 9 year old Austin, Texas based Public-access television cable TV show called The Reel Deal...
also praised one of the shootout scenes, saying "It is surely the best shootout scene we have seen in decades." Writing in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Laremy Lengel titled his review "The Town Works Best if You Avoid the Heat," also referencing Mann's film.
As a Boston-based crime drama, the film forms part of a "crime-movie subgenre" typically marked by "flavorsome accents, pungent atmosphere and fatalistic undertow," according to Chang. Within that subgenre, which includes The Boondock Saints
The Boondock Saints
The Boondock Saints is a 1999 American action comedy film written and directed by Troy Duffy. The film stars Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus as Irish fraternal twins, Connor and Murphy MacManus, who become vigilantes after killing two members of the Russian Mafia in self-defense...
, The Departed
The Departed
The Departed is a 2006 American crime thriller film, fashioned as a remake of the 2002 Hong Kong film Infernal Affairs. The film was directed by Martin Scorsese and written by William Monahan...
, Mystic River
Mystic River (film)
Mystic River is a 2003 American drama film directed, co-produced and scored by Clint Eastwood, starring Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, Kevin Bacon, Laurence Fishburne, Marcia Gay Harden, Laura Linney and Emmy Rossum. The film was written by Brian Helgeland, based on Dennis Lehane's novel of the same...
and Affleck's Gone Baby Gone
Gone Baby Gone
Gone Baby Gone is a 2007 American crime drama-mystery film directed by Ben Affleck and starring his brother Casey Affleck. The screenplay by Ben Affleck and Aaron Stockard is based on the novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane, author of Mystic River and Shutter Island...
, The Town is more of a straightforward crime-procedural and has a more optimistic outlook.
Awards and nominations
The cast has been nominated for several awards from the Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Cast and the National Board of Review.Also, Jeremy Renner
Jeremy Renner
Jeremy Lee Renner is a two-time Academy-Award-nominated American actor and musician. Renner appeared in films throughout the 2000s, mostly in supporting roles. He came to prominence in films such as Dahmer , S.W.A.T. , Neo Ned , 28 Weeks Later and The Hurt Locker...
has received nominations for Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture, Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor
Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor
Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the...
. Pete Postlethwaite
Pete Postlethwaite
Peter William "Pete" Postlethwaite, OBE, was an English stage, film and television actor.After minor television appearances including in The Professionals, Postlethwaite's first success came with the film Distant Voices, Still Lives in 1988. He played a mysterious lawyer, Mr...
has posthumously been nominated for a BAFTA
64th British Academy Film Awards
The 64th British Academy Film Awards, more commonly known as the BAFTAs, were held on 13 February 2011 honouring the best national and foreign films of 2010. The nominees were announced on 18 January 2011. The King's Speech earned the most nominations with fourteen...
for Best Supporting Actor. The film has also received several Satellite Award nominations for Renner, Affleck as director, film editing, adapted screenplay, and best motion picture drama.
Charlestown, bank robbery and crime
A voice in the trailer of the film says: "There are over 300 bank robberies in Boston every year. Most of these professionals live in a 1-square-mile neighborhood called Charlestown." In fact, there were 23 reported bank robberies in the entire Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the first quarter of 2010, compared with 49 in Illinois and 136 in California, according to the FBI.The film itself, however, only states that "One blue-collar Boston neighborhood has produced more bank robbers and armored car theives than anywhere in the world." It then quotes an unnamed Boston Robbery Task Force Federal Agent as saying, "Bank robbery became like a trade in Charlestown, passed down from father to son." During the film, Agent Frawley says something very similar along the lines of this quote while conversing with Claire, and also mentions that the traditional procedure of the BPD whenever a call about an armored car robbery comes in is to close the Charlestown Bridge
Charlestown Bridge
The Charlestown Bridge is the easternmost bridge on the Charles River in Boston, Massachusetts. The bridge formerly carried the southernmost stretch of Massachusetts Route 99, which now ends at Chelsea Street in Charlestown. It connects to Joe Tecce Way to the south and to Rutherford Avenue to the...
.
The film also ends with a written disclaimer: "Charlestown's reputation as a breeding ground for armed robbers is authentic. However, this film all but ignores the great majority of the residents of Charlestown, past and present, who are the same good and true people found most anywhere."
According to a September 2010 article in The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...
, Charlestown was once known as an area where bank robbers were concentrated, but has not been since the mid-1990s, and the subject has been a sore point for "Townies". Now much of the neighborhood has been gentrified
Gentrification
Gentrification and urban gentrification refer to the changes that result when wealthier people acquire or rent property in low income and working class communities. Urban gentrification is associated with movement. Consequent to gentrification, the average income increases and average family size...
. There is some sense of rivalry between Townies, people who lived in the historically Irish-Catholic neighborhood for decades, and "Tunies", largely white-collar workers who arrived with gentrification, but most of that has died down, the newspaper reports. http://www.boston.com/yourtown/boston/charlestown/articles/2010/09/18/afflecks_new_film_is_the_talk_of_the_townies/ The film makes reference to the definition of "Tunies" during one of Doug and Claire's dates.
In the early 1990s, an increase in the number of bank and armored car robberies by Townies focused attention on Charlestown. In one heist in Hudson, New Hampshire, two guards were killed, and is alluded to in the film - during a scene where Agent Frawley is briefing his task force, he mentions that Doug's father is serving life for a notable armored car robbery in Nashwood. According to Frawley, he hijacked a bread truck up to New Hampshire, and when one of the guards saw his face, he executed both of them with their own weapons (Frawley notes that this incident led to the passing of regulations prohibiting the driver from leaving the cab even if their partner was being held at gunpoint). Charles Hogan got the idea for his novel, on which the film is based, in 1995. "It was just so remarkable that this one very small community was the focus for bank robbers," he said, but he was very aware that crime was only one part of the community, and he did not want to make all residents of the neighborhood look like criminals. At the film's premiere, Affleck made a similar statement: "Charlestown isn’t full of bank robbers and Dorchester isn’t full of bad guys and Southie isn’t full of math geniuses
Good Will Hunting
Good Will Hunting is a 1997 drama film directed by Gus Van Sant and starring Matt Damon, Robin Williams, Ben Affleck, Minnie Driver, and Stellan Skarsgård...
or bad people."
Jack O'Callahan
Jack O'Callahan
John J. "Jack" O'Callahan is a retired professional ice hockey player who played 390 NHL regular season games between 1982 and 1989 for the Chicago Blackhawks and New Jersey Devils...
, a Charlestown native born in 1957, said there was an element of crime in Charlestown when he grew up there, "But it didn't bleed into the neighborhood. And those guys were pretty good parents who went to church on Sundays. They were gangsters, but they were good neighbors."