How to Steal a Million
Heist Comedy | 123 Minutes | 1966 | United States
(2.5/4)
Director: William Wyler | Screenplay: Harry Kurnitz | Based on: ‘Venus Rising’ by George Bradshaw | Starring: Audrey Hepburn, Peter O’Toole, Hugh Griffith, Eli Wallach | Music: John Williams | Cinematography: Charles Lang
Nicole Bonnet (Audrey Hepburn) is the daughter of an art forger, who has gathered so many supposed masterpieces in his private collection that he has won considerable renown in the world of art. Approached by the Kléber-Lafayette Museum, he proudly loans to the illustrious Paris institution (which for the sake of the film occupies the building of the real-life Musée Carnavalet) his most prized possession, his Cellini ‘Venus’. In fact the statue is a fake, the elaborate handiwork of his own father: forgery evidently runs in the family.
Nicole grows increasingly concerned that her father will be found out. When the museum decides to authenticate the statue, she enlists the help of an apparent art thief, Simon Dermott (Peter O’Toole), who has been skulking with intent about the family home. Together the duo stalk the Kléber-Lafayette Museum after hours, and when their perseverance pays off, they make away with the Cellini ‘Venus’ as romance beckons.
This lighthearted heist caper manages to seem at once generic, overlong, and structurally awkward. In the early going we dwell within the Bonnet house to the point of claustrophobia, while the heist itself proves interminable, uneventful and repetitious as Nicole and Simon fumble in and out of a broom closet, grope for keys, scrub floors, and set off false alarm after false alarm until the museum guards finally tire and give up the chase. Despite big sets, the Paris location, and Hepburn’s Givenchy wardrobe, it all feels remarkably small scale, a brief skit about a bumbling museum theft drawn out and dealt with so lavishly that it loses whatever charm it might have possessed.
Emotionally with Hepburn we are always on a slow burn, as our initial impression of attractive vacuity gives way not only to her unusual gracefulness, but to real nuance and emotional heft. But here William Wyler – who had previously directed Hepburn in the exquisite Roman Holiday (1953), now only a few pictures away from the close of his career – belabours and overworks the thin material. Hepburn could draw winning performances out of both top-tier and second-string leading men, but the foppish Peter O’Toole fails to endow his character with any roguish interest.
At least Hepburn stars; while Hugh Griffith as Charles Bonnet, and Eli Wallach as Davis Leland, Nicole’s wealthy American admirer, are impeccably cast. Despite its flaws How to Steal a Million is pleasant enough to watch once, especially if you’re a Hepburn fan and enjoy 1960s chic, and it just about warrants the half star.
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