THE TOWN

title: THE TOWN

year: 2010

cast: Ben Affleck, Jeremy Renner, Jon Hamm, Rebecca Hall

rating: **1/2

This is a decent movie with a flimsy premise. After a bank robbery involving revved up New Jersey thugs wearing Skeletor masks, the leader, played by director Ben Affleck, stalks (keeps an eye on) a pretty employee they'd kidnapped during the getaway... because she lives in the same town, or something. Predictably, a romance blossoms between Ben and girl-next-door Rebecca Hall, but the gang's lethal member, Jeremy Renner, doesn't like it. And FBI agent Jon Hamm wants to bring the boys down before striking again, which happens in two rushed scenes liken to Michael Mann's HEAT: lots of gun-fire between drawn-out dialog (the film's bulk), establishing characters more than driving them.