Sometimes You Lose and Sometimes You Win: Crime-Part Two from IMDbGerard Butler From Wikipedia.com
Crime, Part Two
Part Two of these suspenseful crime dramas is ‘Sometimes You Lose and Sometimes You Win: Crime, Part Two’. It focuses on Den of Thieves.
But who or what is actually the ‘den of thieves’? Is it the lawmen or is it the thieves? In my opinion, it isn’t clear cut. This movie focuses mostly on big losses and a lack of good guy/bad guy distinctions. Ultimately, the ending is one huge surprise of ‘sometimes you win’. But I don’t want to get ahead of myself.
Sometimes You Lose
Similar to The Town, there is coincidently quite a bit of violence as well as a loss in the plot. Unfortunately my personal hero, Pablo Schreiber loses his life. Meanwhile, my personal villain, Gerard Butler wins the shootout with Pablo. But at the sametime he wrecks his marriage.
Pablo Schreiber from Wikipedia.com
Den of Thieves
Once again this brilliantly laid out plan could have been the heist of a lifetime. In the beginning, we are all led to believe that the target an ordinary suburban Los Angeles bank robbery.
Meanwhile the branch of a local Los Angeles bank where the thieves strike happens to have an underground tunnel with access to the Los Angeles Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank building. What a coincidence. Eventually the sheriff and his men discover this. But not before the heist is well under way.
Decoy
In the meantime, the bank robbers use this detour as a decoy that almost completely fools the Los Angeles Sheriff’s office headed by none other than Gerard Butler.
Winners and Losers
While he and his crew of lawmen may seem to be the winners, Pablo Schreiber’s den of thieves certainly seem to be the losers. But things are not what they seem.
Who’s the Biggest Loser?
Yes, Pablo gets shot down. And yes, Gerard Butler wins the shootout. Meanwhile, Gerard gets served divorce papers. Seen as hero of the law, he is a horrible husband. Even though he is a winner as a lawman, he is a big loser at everything else. He is truly a contradiction in terms of humanity.
O’Shea Jackson Jr. from IMDb
Sometimes You Win
O’Shea Jackson Jr, aka Donnie, ‘the driver’ played by Ice Cube’s real life son is the winner of this mostly losing but also winning plot. Hints of O’Shea’s cleverness pop up along the way. One major clue is the fact that Donnie’s job is at the bar by the crime scene.
Throughout the film, this bartender collects identity tags accidently left by bank employees. At times the viewer does not know if the target for this heist is actually his rather than Pablo’s or his sidekick played by the character, ’50 cents’ aka Curtis James Jackson III.
Who Really Planned the Heist?
At times it is impossible to conclude who really planned this heist, Pablo aka Merrimen or O’Shea aka Donnie. But the winner is clearly Donnie as he packs up the loot in old rubber tires, ships it somewhere and moves onto London to work in a bar across from the diamond exchange. No coincidence there.
