Best Laid Plans: Interrogating the Heist Film

The heist film, in which a robbery aimed at a financial institution or some other lucrative business forms the spine of the story, has remained a steady part of crime cinema for many years. This collection asks a question that is harder to answer than it looks: why has the heist film held audiences over so many decades and across very different cultures?

The twelve essays, edited by Jim Leach and Jeannette Sloniowski, explore what gives the genre its significance and how it works in different contexts. Together they treat the heist as a subject worth studying rather than a simple entertainment formula.

Film scholars and readers interested in crime cinema will find the collection relevant to their work.

Edition note: published by Wayne State University Press. ISBN-13: 9780814342244.