Den of Thieves was written, produced, and directed by Christian Gudegast, one of the writers for London has Fallen. Gerard Butler stars in both films. Filling out the rest of the cast is O'Shea Jackson, Jr. (Straight Outta Compton), Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson (Power), Mo McRae (Pitch), Pablo Schreiber (13 Hours), and Evan Jones (Jarhead). Gudegast did well in his directorial debut, and the acting was great; especially from O'Shea Jackson, Jr., Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson, Gerard Butler, and Pablo Schreiber.
The storyline could have been predictable and a repeat of similar films, but instead it managed to tell a new and different story. In the trailer, Nick O'Brien (Butler) says "You're not the bad guys, we are," but in the film he takes it to a whole other level than the audience would expect. It's not so much in a corrupt way, but more like there's no line I won't cross to get under your skin. The action is great, because it's enhanced by the uniqueness of bank robbers with military backgrounds utilizing military precision and strategy in shootouts with law enforcement.
The film also does a great job of not leaning more towards one side, outlaws vs. regulators, which allows the audience to be emotionally tied or invested to both sides at the same time. Ultimately, this pays off in allowing the audience to really enjoy and be invested in the final scenes, including the final twist; which was a completely unexpected twist for most of the movie. It was well played and didn't leave any loose ends in tying the entire film to the final scene. It also left room for a potential sequel!
The film wasn't perfect though. There were some areas that could have been improved. The middle of the film gets a bit slow in the Federal Reserve Bank scenes. It can get a slight pass on this, given the situation taking place in those scenes, but it would have been great if the film found a way to show the effort it took to successfully break into the Federal Reserve Bank without making the audience feel like the film was dragging a bit.
Another disappointing aspect of the film were what seemed like setups to give us more background or history on the characters being ultimately left open. The glaring example being when one of the officers questions what happened to make someone from the military turn to a life of crime as a bank robber. This leads the audience to believe that at some point the film would reveal some interesting backstory about how Merrimen (Schreiber) went from a military career to a career of robbing banks. Unfortunately, the audience never gets this backstory.
However, overall the film was very enjoyable! Great laughs. Great action. Great characters. Great story. Also, bonus points for being 1 of 2 films in the 2000's with none other than Eric Braeden (Ziggy), aka Gudegast's father, better known as Victor Newman from the Young and the Restless (had to throw that in for my grandma)!
8.5/10