Scene Selection — Geoff Carter: Warm memories of Yates’ ‘The Hot Rock’

Friday, March 14, 2003 | 8:45 a.m.

Geoff Carter is a Seattle based free-lance film critic and entertainment writer. Reach him at carter@pre2k.com.

The other day I was talking to a friend about what I consider to be the Golden Age of heist pictures -- that fruitful period, from 1964 to 1974, during which "Topkapi," "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three," "The Sting," "The Italian Job," "The Getaway," "The Pink Panther" and many others were released. I was only around for the tail end of that run, but even then I thought "cat burglar" was a pretty attractive career option.

So many heist movies have come out over the years -- some good, many bad -- that it's hard to remember all of them, and I've nearly lost some good ones. Take "The Hot Rock," a 1972 Peter Yates diamond heist picture starring Robert Redford.

It's got more than its share of quotable dialogue (Mugger: "I like your watch." Victim: "Keep praying. Maybe God will reward you"). It' s got a sterling cast: Robert Redford, George Segal, Zero Mostel. It's got great set pieces, including a clever and funny raid on a police station.

I've recommended "The Hot Rock" to dozens of friends, very few of which have ever heard of it. Those who have tried to rent it have had a difficult time finding it in video stores.

Sure, the picture is far from perfect, but I can 't help but wonder how it earned this relative obscurity. Even Yates' silly "Mother, Jugs and Speed" is more widely remembered, probably because of its title.

That said, I suspect Ronny Yu's "Formula 51" (Columbia/TriStar DVD, $27.99), a British caper film starring Samuel L. Jackson and Robert Carlyle, is headed for the same boneyard. It is a fate the film scarcely deserves.

It's not for everyone -- there are two gross-out scenes of epic proportions, and its main character is a purveyor of illegal drugs -- but it deserves better than to be forgotten with "Swordfish," "Knockaround Guys" and all the other also-rans of the "Pulp Fiction" decade.

Jackson plays Elmo McElroy, a master chemist and 6-foot-tall kilt wearing, golf club-wielding, all-around bad mamma-jamma. He is Shaft by way of Sean Connery, and Jackson clearly has fun with the role.

Whether swinging a 9-iron like a master swordsman (he shot "Formula" immediately after "Star Wars") or inveighing against the Beatles' hometown of "Liver-(expletive)-fool," Jackson makes his fun contagious.

The plot of "Formula 51" is pure Swiss cheese, but that's all right. We recognize so many of "51's" elements from other films that we can use those other stories to plug its potholes and drive right through, stopping to enjoy a few select attractions.

The staggeringly beautiful Emily Mortimer, as hired gun Dakota Phillips, is one, as is the roguishly charming Robert Carlyle, who plays small-time thug Felix DeSouza as a close relative of Begbie, his mercurial character from "Trainspotting."

As with "The Hot Rock," many of "Formula 51's" best elements are minor. There's something about watching Jackson -- who says in the DVD's making-of documentary that he took the role primarily to wear a kilt -- smacking golf balls off a garbage barge into the Mersey, or watching him sell the formula for his new recreational drug, "POS 51," to prospective buyers with the charm and authority of a preacher.

And, as it is with many Jackson roles, it's fun to watch how he reacts when things go wrong.

"Can't a brother just sell some (expletive) drugs?" he asks the heavens after police raid? "Formula 51" proves that, despite some minor side effects, he can. Jackson's got the goods, and they're worth as much as any hot rock you might find lying around.