Ipso Facto There are Some raving comments here that make me wonder about their group age.I am a big fan of Korean movies but not any Korean movies, only the great ones;and this one is definitely not one of them.It's pale with a painfully idiotic writing and horrendous acting .I got a headache trying to figure out what the hell was going on.The scriptwriter obviously wrote it while he was chilling out with the crew in Macau maybe because this is the kind of lame writing you churn out when you have no intention to exert the slightest amount of effort You can go to take a nap and come back and you will not miss anything because there's nothing there to miss. It's definitely a huge waste of time.

Paul Magne Haakonsen Finally I got a chance to watch "The Thieves" ("Dodookdeul"), and the wait was well worth it. This movie was fantastic in every aspect.The story is about a group of Korean and Hong Kong thieves who come together for a mutual heist to steal a very expensive diamond. But things take a turn for the worse and the heist doesn't go as planned. Alliances are forged and broken, and the game of deception runs high, and just what is honor amongst thieves truly worth?I will say that the storyline was compelling and interesting. Sure it could be compared to "Oceans Eleven" and with elements of "Mission Impossible" in it, but it would be a shame to do so, because "The Thieves" is unique in its own right.The story was not predictable and just as you thought you had figured out what was next, the movie took an unforeseen turn and totally throws off the audience. This is the part that I really like about the storyline, it was kept fresh and constantly on the toes.Director Dong-Hoon Choi have managed to put together a great movie that is entertaining, exciting and thrilling. And what really helps the movie along nicely are the people on the cast list. Wow! They really have some of the great talents from both the Korean and Hong Kong cinema alike. Gianna Jun, Simon Yam and Jung-Jae Lee really go all the way here and carry the movie so nicely."The Thieves" is a definite 'must' watch movie of you enjoy Asian cinema, regardless of your preference to Korean or Hong Kong cinema.This movie is a clear 8 out of 10 stars without a doubt.

moviexclusive The purported selling point here is so lazy and easy it's slutty: the most anticipated star-studded action blockbuster 2012! Unless The Thieves intends to pay homage to The Avengers, this year's only rightful owner to that headline, we can't verify the credibility of that audacious claim. Granted, the movie's A-list ensemble of the most bankable stars from around the region places it in a perfect position to sell itself to the usual fandom, but I'm usually sceptical of such an approach to filmmaking. The good news? The Thieves is everything it pledges to be in marketing and message – epic, smart, funny and well- shot. The bad news? It's not quite everything it needs to be.Hardened robber Macao Park wants to steal a $20 million diamond from a casino in Macau. In order to pull off the perfect heist, he enlists the services of Korean and Chinese thieves. What looks to be a smooth heist suddenly shatters into a botched job as each thief begins to reveal their true motives and lots of betrayals and grudges surface before any thief can get to the diamond. The real winner here is Macao Park, who has deliberately assembled this double-crossing team of thieves so that he can escape with the diamond. Unfortunately, trouble catches up to him before he can safely pocket the prize. Each thief must now fight to survive and find the diamond before time runs out.Let's face it: this is the sort of heist movie that can only look good with a greedy scale, even if it's with one that's only initially superficial. Director Choi Dong-hoon doesn't scrimp here, getting stars from Korea, Hong Kong and Malaysia and wrangling with a multilingual dialogue that speaks Korean, Mandarin, Japanese and English. It makes for an amusing preamble that sees our group of thieves engage in almost endless banter, effectively using the barriers of language to allow one party to criticize the other without the other actually realising it. The thieves eventually manage to pull their thinking caps together, navigating through the complex security at the casino with an equally cartoonish verve. So far, so good, right?That question is important because the movie totally loses control once it hits the second half. I'll admit upfront that the movie is very smart – or at least its multitude of subplots is. But the fundamental problem with The Thieves is that it has well over a dozen major characters competing for screen time. I can't stress enough how a burgeoning character count is to the detriment of a movie's quality. With so many personal agendas / betrayals / grudges on offer, The Thieves struggles to tie all its subplots into a concise, clear and easily comprehensible script, instead allowing them to dart uncontrollably in all directions. It's incredibly labourious to keep track of who's doing what or even which diamond is real. Above all else, The Thieves would have worked better as a TV serial; condensed into movie length, it wears out any form of sanity too quickly.That's not to say The Thieves isn't without any more charms. The movie is a stacked deck of balletically choreographed action scenes that become increasingly daring, and we dare say reckless, as it progresses. Characters are allowed to fight in places that don't traditionally grace the screen for action scenes, including an elevator shaft and the surface of a building. There's an action scene which, in the perfect storm of horrible coincidence, is virtually the same as Tom Cruise's vertiginous adventure on the surface of Dubai's Burj Khalifa tower in last year's Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. The only thing that's better than this action segment is the relentless pace at which the movie pumps out gunfire.Watching The Thieves is like flirting with James Bond. You get a curious mix of charisma and danger, and you don't know whether you should stay or leave: the charisma is appealing, but the danger is off-putting. The Thieves is far from perfection, but if you're willing to overlook the messy second half and indulge in the amusement and exhilaration of the package, then this so-called most anticipated star-studded action blockbuster 2012 is worth a visit to the cinema.

Harry T. Yung The incorporation of 4 women (three very pretty, one would have been very pretty twenty years ago) does give this flick considerable added appeal. The resemblance to "Ocean's" series, however, is limited. While both involve robbing a casino, the complexity of the job here is child's play compared with George Clooney's schemes. On the other hand, this one strives on relationships between the various people in the gang, present and past – betrayals, romances, policy undercover, double-crosses. The main stage is Korea while the action takes place is Macau, with planning and aftermath scenes in Hong Kong.I shall make no attempt to deconstruct the plot and sub-plots, the events, the roles, apparent and real. What follows is only an attempt to briefly outline the line-up, hopefully spoiler-free.The guiding spirit of the project is Macao Park (Kim Yun-seok) who brings together 9 people, 4 from Hong Kong and 5 from Korea, to help him steal a 20-million-US-dollar diamond currently kept at a casino in Macau. The idea is to fend the spoil to connoisseurs in the Southeast Asia. Among the potential buyers is the owner of the jewel himself, a powerful kingpin so mysterious that only two members of the gang claim to have seen him.The Hong Kong group of 4 is much simpler, comprising leader Chen (Simon Yam), safe-cracking expert Julie (Angelica Lee) and two gunmen Andrew and Johnny. Julie has learned her trade from her father, reminding you of Charlize Theron in the new "Italian Job". Andrew is the designated clown in the group. The only thing special about Johnny is that he is played by Derek Tsang, Eric Tsang's son.The Korean group of 5 has a much more complex history of relationships. The movie actually opens with job lead by Popeye (Lee Jung-jae) who worked with Marco a few years ago. His present 3 team members however do not know Macao, except by reputation. Gianna Jun, sassy as ever and sexier than usual, plays a sort of spider woman Yenicall. Chewingum is a middle-aged woman, veteran but bottle-addicted. Zampano is a young pretty boy fierce in combat. Together with Popeye, involved in the aforementioned job with Macao a few years ago is beautiful Pepsi (Kim Hye-soo), just released from a jail term for her involvement in the job while Macao and Popeye were not caught. While on the surface, the trio act as if they have forgotten and forgiven (not sure who should forgive whom at this point) the ominous undercurrent is stirred up by intermittent flashbacks.It is not difficult to follow the characters and their multi-dimension interactions are interesting. The good action sequences, including a couple of showy set pieces, make up for the lacking in subtleties. The two-hour-plus screen time will pass unnoticed, enjoyably.