44 Minutes - The North Hollywood Shoot-Out Reviews

Top Notch shoot um up

I seen this movie a while ago, it is a great account of the infamous North Hollywood shootout.

great shootout scenes (nearly as good as the one from heat)

If you like shoot um ups then this is for you.

action all the way through

pretty good

this is a fairly accurate account of the notorious events the title is based on. I've seen the real minute by minute documentary on it and the film is pretty factually accurate. There are little bits missed out and added of course for the purpose of helping the drama, action and entertainment. All in all a good watch, but it helps if you know the background to the actual events.

[Highly rated reviewer]

Wasted a great story.

This movie has that “Made for TV” look about it. Based around the notorious robbery of The Bank of America in North Hollywood, it has so much potential but the way it has been made goes about relating the story all wrong.

Michael Madsen sends yet another performance in by post. It’s not that he gives a bad show, it’s just that his acting style seems very smarmy and contrived to me, as were the characters sub plots (if they can be called plots) which are heavily laced with pointless sentimentality.

This movie is really just a love letter to how pure, brave and courageous the officers involved that day were. That’s all it tries to do, that’s the only place the story wants to go, and it left me feeling like: what was the point?

Telling the story from the LAPD POV was the wrong way to go for me. This Movie would have been infinitely more satisfying if it was told from the POV of the Robbers. That would have given the movie depth and the staying power it so sadly lacks. I understand that the police involved that day went way beyond the call of duty. I get that. But this is a movie at the end of the day, and the fact is that the police characters are bland and uninteresting as screen creations. To explore the relationship between the robbers and what was driving them would have been a far more interesting character study for me personally and it has been completely ignored here.

There is one saving grace, however. The actual shoot-out in question is impressive. It is well shot and edited and gets across the velocity of the firepower that the police were up against that day. I read some reviews saying that the shoot-out is just as impressive as the one from Heat. It comes no where close in my book. Not even in the same league as the shoot-out from heat. So with that said, is a good shoot-out sequence enough reason to rent this movie? I would have to say no. I’m sure you could just find the shoot-out on u-tube and save yourself the bother of sitting through those sentimental story fillers. Not worth the bother!

shoot my own limbs off

This is the WORST thriller-come-shoot-'em-up film I've ever had the misfortune to have to sit through. I would rather shoot my own limbs off than condemn my worst enemy to have to see it. (Except Colette Hume)

[Highly rated reviewer]

IT'S ALRIGHT. YOU COULD DO A LOT WORSE.

The fact it was based on a true story gave it credibility above the usual run-of-the-mill fare. Madsen was miscast in this, nowhere near enough for him to get his surly teeth into.

ONLY 4 STUPID PEOPLE !

I don't mind low budget films but this is dreadful. I think the little money they had was spent on the bullets !!!!

better than ceefax

once upon a time you could rely on late-night tv to show movies like this, now it's just tossy phone-in quizzes. '44 minutes' is no great shakes but it's a perfectly-watchable piece of one-dimensional pap – short on plot but lots of shooting, heroics, and god bless the boys in blue. tagged on the end is some info from the true-life case, including the fact that as a result of this 1997 incident the lapd now have access to m16 machine guns. and there's me thinking restricting the public availability of automatic and semi-automatic weapons was the solution. ah well, at least michael madsen paid his mortgage that month and i avoided dealing with my insomnia for an hour or two. you'll watch worse movies than this when expecting more. expect little and you'll come out thinking it wasn't too bad.

Hollywood Rubbish

This has to be one of the worst films i have ever seen.

I appreciate that this was based on a real event, but if you want to know what happened, then try and track down a documentary about the '44 minutes' rather than watch this rubbish.

To try and transfer it to a film was riddiculous, and i think it made the LAPD look incompetent. They were obviously under extreme pressure, but surely one policeman could have hit them in the legs with at least one bullet to slow them down, or better still made a head shot. Instead, they wasted all that ammunition firing at two people standing outside a bank and it went on for 44 minutes.

Avoid this film, and watch the documentary if you are interested.

very graphic

The two gunman are shown to be absolute pyschos with no respect for law or anyone.

When they start there bloodbath, the effects of the bullets being fired at anything that moves is very good.

Mainly this film is just to show how powerful machine guns are etc.

A simple, yet frightening film, which is worth a look.

maria from lincs

a great film, unbelievable that it was based on a true story. if youv'e not watched it you must.