Way Down - A Pretty Interesting Movie of Bank Heist During Soccer World Cup

Somehow I missed out on this movie that was released few days ago and only realized it on Friday. Yesterday though my wife and I finally got the chance to see this one. It only played in one cinema chain but it happened to be shown in one of the theater not far from our home. OK, let's get it on.

Brief Story Line

Thom (Freddie Highmore - The Good Doctor TV series, The Spiderwick Chronicles etc) was a genius engineer who was doubtful about his future and was recruited to join a group of people led by Walter, a wealthy owner of salvaging company. Walter (Liam Cunningham - 24 Hours to Live etc).  Walter was planning to do a heist on Bank of Spain during the soccer World Cup of 2010.

Together with other members of the team such as the con artist Lorraine (Àstrid Bergès-Frisbey - King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, The Sea Wall etc), the computer hacker Klaus (Axel Stein), the logistic expert Simon (Luis Tosar) and Walter's right hand man James (Sam Riley - Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, Radioactive etc),  Thom was ready to use his mind to crack the nearly impossible place to infiltrate.

So how would the story conclude? You can find them all in this interesting heist movie.

End of Brief Story Line

I was interested in giving this movie a try after finding out that its premise was a heist. As my wife and I are fans of heist stories, this one definitely intrigued us. At first though, I thought the opening part was a bit too detail but I guess it was to give perspective on why the heist would happen. Anyway though, after Thom was introduced, I felt it was a bit more interesting. But the movie started to become really exciting once the preparation of heist began.

The characters involved were pretty engaging. I quite liked Thom's character and Freddie Highmore was quite convincing as this genius engineer. Liam Cunningham was also a good choice as the leader Walter and Sam Riley was perfect as the guy who always annoyingly challenged Thom. In addition to the people who performed the heist, there were also other cast such as José Coronado as the head of security Gustavo Medina and Famke Janssen (The Postcard Killings, Hemlock Grove TV series etc) as British official Margaret. 

The heist itself was certainly the main attraction in the movie. There was the usual intelligent way of finding out how to do the impossible thing, but the time sensitive part really added the element of suspense. Obviously a heist would not be really captivating without the character who was always suspicious and trying to capture them, and I believe Coronado was spot on as Medina. Btw, I do not think this movie was like Ocean's Eleven trilogy (which was funnily mentioned in here), but it felt a bit more like Money Heist series, especially since the object was Bank of Spain.

There were a bit of action here and there but it is not a full action type. It has a duration of 118 minutes without any mid or post end credit scene. It has a satisfying enough ending for me and both of us actually enjoyed this film, even though we did not have too high expectations earlier. I think the factor that made me like this movie was Thom's character as he was not the typical criminal, but his genius mind was really a joy to watch while trying to solve life threatening problem. 

After reading more on the movie on the internet, I found out that it was actually a 2021 Spanish production originally titled The Vault but having the title of Way Down in Asian countries. It was directed by Jaume Balagueró who was experienced in directing Spain horror movies. It was also quite well received by critics with positive reviews. So if you are in doubt of what movie to see this weekend, this one might be a good option.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars