The Thomas Crown Affair

Monday, April 24, 2023

35mm print! Director John McTiernan will join Matt Zoller Seitz by phone for a discussion following the screening.

Glamorous, decadent fun from start to finish, Roger Ebert called The Thomas Crown Affair “the kind of sophisticated caper that Cary Grant used to walk through without getting his suit wrinkled.” Pierce Brosnan stars as a wealthy, mysterious art thief who steals Monet’s masterpiece “San Giorgio Maggiore at Dusk” from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Rene Russo as Catherine Banning, the insurance investigator who is determined to catch Crown so that her company won’t have to pay the museum $100 million. Brosnan gives one of his smartest, most insinuating performances as Crown, a master manipulator who has a knack for making everyone feel as if they might be the only person he’s ever been honest with. Russo matches his ice-cube coolness. Part of the fun in their interactions is not knowing when one is playing the other and, if so, whether the attempt succeeded or the target only made them think it did. Working from a clever script by Kim Dixon and Kurt Wimmer, director John McTiernan (Die Hard, The Hunt for Red October) treats each scene as a showcase for fabulous faces, bodies, clothes, architecture, vehicles, and landscapes. Thomas Crown is a remake of Norman Jewison’s same-named 1968 caper flick starring Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway; Dunaway has a supporting role as Crown’s psychiatrist.

Presented as part of the series Movies with MZS – Spring 2023

 

  • Country USA
  • Year 1999
  • Running Time 113 minutes
  • Format 35mm
  • Distributor Park Circus
  • Director John McTiernan
  • Cast Pierce Brosnan, Rene Russo, Denis Leary, Fritz Weaver

IFC Center does not generally provide advisories about subject matter or potentially triggering content in films, as sensitivities vary from person to person. In addition to the synopses, trailers and other links on our website, further information about content and age-appropriateness for specific films can be found on Common Sense Media, IMDb and DoesTheDogDie.com as well as through general internet searches.