"Filmed Record" review: Street Thief (A&E)
06/21/07 02:01 PM
By ED BARK
The con is on. Or is it? Or is he?
Street Thief, premiering Thursday (June 21) under the A&E IndieFilms banner, has the look of a documentary but the overall feel of a fascinating fraud.
The 90-minute film (9 p.m. central on A&E) sparked considerable controversy at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival, where its director/producer brothers, Malik and Sam Bader, did little to dissuade the audience from believing the worst. Namely, that the filmmakers had followed real-life thief Kaspar Carr on a series of Chicago heists that climactically netted him a $104,100 haul at a Cinemark movieplex.
Kaspar, profane and cocksure, is first seen busting into and robbing a La Chiquita Mercado in this gritty, matter-of-fact "filmed record."
Later, while counting his cash, he claims to have been hooked on thievery ever since his grandma filched armloads of candy at a supermarket on Halloween night. Kaspar says he was seven years old at the time, and "that's when it (expletive) started. I was infected with this (expletive)."
The filmmakers make his rounds with him, with Kaspar methodically casing out his potential hits before making any strikes. There's one exception, though, an impulsive robbery at the dive-y Slick's Lounge. This later figures into a storyline that veers from how-to to whodunit.
Street Thief's center-ring criminal is guarded one minute, expansive the next.
"So, uh, why are you a professional thief?" he's asked.
"Who said I'm a professional?" he retorts before ordering his questioners to lay off any personal or motivational stuff.
"You're here so you can see how (expletive) goes down," Kaspar says. "You're not gonna get a sob story out of me."
There also are intermittent interviews with someone who's supposed to be an incarcerated thief housed in the Statesville Correctional Center in Joliet. There is such a place, but the prisoner just doesn't seem as real as Kaspar.
Closing credits for the film list no Kaspar Carr, but include thanks to the Chicago and Illinois film offices. It's doubtful that either would be party to a movie in which real-life robberies are documented with no intention of turning the thief in.
The Bader brothers have been coy about all of this, but it seems clear that they've made one helluva fake-out that later veers less successfully into a detective story. Consider Street Thief to be the Blair Witch Project of crime films, a hypnotically watchable tightrope act working without a net.
Troubling, however, are the tips the film offers on how to plan and execute a one-person heist. They seem real enough to be drawn from first-hand experiences. But after all is said and done . . . well, that would be giving away too much. Let's just say that Street Thief is unique, disturbing and riveting from start to stop.
In the end, it doesn't merit a gold star. But a film this convincing and involving doesn't deserve detention either.
Grade: B+
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