About a week or so ago I was scrolling through my Facebook feed and noticed an article entitled something along the lines of 'This year don't watch 'Die Hard', watch 'Silent Partner'. Now while I did watch 'Die Hard' this year I also watched 'Silent Partner', a Canadian produced, crime thriller that opens during the Christmas season.
A remake of the 1969 Danish film 'Think of a Number', and based on a novel by Dane Anders Bodelsen, 'Partner' stars Elliot Gould as the lead teller at a Toronto bank located inside a busy shopping mall. Gould's character Miles Cullen figures out that a charity bell ringing Santa (Christopher Plumber) is in fact casing the bank and planning a robbery. Not usually a risk taker (he is a single bank teller around 40 years old, who lives in an apartment and collects tropical fish), this opportunity somehow posses Cullen, he hides about $50,000 in his brief case before the robbery can happen, then when Plumber robs the bank he gets away with only chump change, while the bank and the cops think he's gotten away with ten's of thousands of dollars (Canadian).
Harry Reikle, Plumber's character, figures out from the cash discrepancy on the news what has happened, and he's not the kind of guy you want to piss off. Plumber is quite scary in this, he sets about trying to get the money and revenge on Miles, and the resulting movie is a smart, edge of your seat thriller in the best of the Hitchcock tradition.
Cullen's risk taking translates into a new found since of confidence and two potential romantic interests for himself, a fellow bank employee played by Susannah York, and the mysterious Elaine, played by the fetching young French-Canadian pop singer Celine Lomez.
I was really impressed with this, I really enjoyed it, seldom does such an obvious Hitchcock homage work so well on it's own. A sleeper hit upon release, the film won Best Picture, and Best Director (Darly Duke) at the now defunct Canadian Film Academy Awards. Richly deserving of rediscovery, next year you might think about pairing it with 'Die Hard'. Also featuring a young John Candy in an early bit part. ***1/2
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