Crime 101 Review - A bloated throwback thriller that has the vibes
A bloated throwback thriller that has the vibes
By: Alfred Castaneda, Executive Editor and Editor-in-Chief
The kind of thriller that Crime 101 is harkens back to the 1990’s and early 2000’s when more of them were being produced and were attracting major talent to new, original concepts. At least that’s how it looks and sounds. Gorgeously shot with a strong cast, Crime 101 has potential. But it crumbles under the weight of its own sprawl and is a film that should be better than it is. The cast is stacked: Chris Hemsworth as the thief with a heart of gold, Mark Ruffalo as the cop on his tail that recognizes this, Halle Berry as the insurance agent (a la Rene Russo from The Thomas Crown Affair), Barry Keoghan as a punk agitator, Monica Barbaro as Hemsworth’s love interest and Nick Nolte as a gray-area crime boss. What could go wrong?
Bart Layton, with his first feature in eight years and adapting it from a novella by Don Winslow is clearly influenced by directors that made their mark in this genre. There will be inevitable comparisons to Michael Mann’s Heat and Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown but the difference between those and this caper lies in the execution. Mann and Tarantino are masters of the payoff, an element that’s lacking here even if Layton tries to wrap it up with a bow. The build-up is a tense, slow burn – emphasis on slow given a two-and-a-half-hour runtime – but the climax leaves you wanting more, especially with the long wait to get there.
With this kind of ensemble, the characters are all about to meet, and it starts hot out of the gate with antihero Mike Davis (Hemsworth) showing some finesse in pulling off his latest jewelry heist. This is something Mike has been methodically doing up and down the 101 with remarkable consistency: no evidence left behind and nobody killed. LAPD detective Lou Lubesnick (Mark Ruffalo, excellent) is the cop assigned to catch him, someone that has profiled Davis through his entire career of heists. He has the usual (and tropey) doubtful partner Rick (Corey Hawkins) and reluctant captain that is borderline trying to – to paraphrase The Wire – “juke the stats.” Insurance expert Sharon (Halle Berry) is there to investigate the latest heist and see if there’s a way they can avoid paying their client a substantial insurance claim.
This is straightforward material, so Layton decides to add more subplot to develop these characters beyond a singular dimension. Mike meets Maya (Monica Barbaro), a Hollywood junior publicist that rams her car accidentally into Mike’s and spurring a shallow romance. A meet cute via State Farm. Hemsworth and Barbaro look more like friends hooking up on a Friday night than two truly romantic partners, but it’s an attempt at showing Mike’s tender side and serves as a counterbalance to Mike’s ill-conceived life of theft. Another subplot has Sharon in a struggle to crack her company’s glass ceiling, repeatedly being passed over for a promotion to partner because she’s 53 and not what the “company’s older rich, male clientele wants.” Both subplots are only mildly successful. Barbaro is capable of so much more (a hollow resemblance to her performance in A Complete Unknown) but isn’t given much to do with a screenplay that has her consistently doubting Mike’s true identity. Berry’s subplot, despite a strong performance here feels like a tacked-on addition to the plot to position her for the lackluster payoff at the end of the film.
The rest of the cast turn in fine turns even if their roles leave us with a desire for more development. Barry Keoghan (Saltburn) throws it back to his punk personality from Bird, being the pawn of Money (Nick Nolte)’s crime operation and serving as his check on Mike after Mike turns down a job in Santa Barbara. Nolte is wasted here, given minor screentime that doesn’t allow Layton to coax much of a performance from. Keoghan raises his motorcycle helmet visor enough to remind us he’s in there, even if his stunt double composes half of his scenes. He’s a sociopath on two wheels and he does a fine job of it. Of all the cast members, however – Hemsworth’s Mike is the furthest out of his comfort zone – and it’s nice to see that he can turn in a memorable performance without a cape (next to his buddy The Hulk!)
The subplots contribute most to the sprawling runtime of nearly two and a half hours. This film didn’t need to be this long. The subplots weren’t critical additions and the film would have been more streamlined without them. It’s always a concern when two editors are needed on a film. Maybe Crime 101needed a third as a tiebreaker because there’s a lot of fat that could have been trimmed. The editing itself on some of the higher octane scenes is robust, but on the whole it could have used some tidying.
At least there’s some solid action moving things along. Not quite on the level of Ronin but stirring in its own way, there are a couple of pulse raising car chase sequences (with and without Keoghan’s motorcycle) accompanied by a bumping electronic score from Blanck Mass that sounds eerily like Hans Zimmer’s Dark Knight work at times. Erik Wilson’s camera takes noir-like spins that evoke Michael Mann and do a superb job of anchoring us to Los Angeles. It’s clear that a bulk of this was shot on location and less on soundstages, unsurprising given Crime 101’s budget (reportedly $90 million pre-marketing) and eventual release on Prime Video. For the most part, Crime 101 looks expensive. At times it does have a Netflix / Prime Video look to it – too polished, and odd choices on saturation and shadows – but it plays well in a theater.
Crime 101 is a fine attempt at recapturing the magic of those peak Mann movies, but it falls short of greatness. There’s strong technical craftsmanship and style at play here. It’s entertaining to see Hemsworth as a thief, running around a beautifully filmed Los Angeles. It’s a stylish and vibey placeholder until Heat 2 comes out.
Rating 7.0 / 10
Disclosure: This critic's rating is inline with their average rating across their coverage universe. A link to our rating methodology can be found here
Posted Feb 11, 2026, 10:27 PM UTC