The original novel written by Gerald A. Browne is a masterpiece, an immediate classic, but it was completely ruined by this lousy film. First of all, the screenplay was horrible! How come you'd use the leading role in this novel, Chesser, played by Charles Grodin, to narrate almost every segment of this film, used him to describe what's going on and what he felt. It made this film like Chesser have become the 1st person in his memoir to talk about what he'd encountered for his revenge and heist against 11 Harrowhouse. We are watching a film instead of listening to an audio recording. What a lousy and lazy arrangement this stupid screenplay was. And then, the director seemed to be a moron who just lazily followed the script and shot the picture as it was. What a stupid moron!Secondly, signing up Charles Grodin to play the protagonist was the 2nd worse thing. This guy was not a good actor, but a deadbeat 2-tier actor with a protruding lower chin and lower lip over his upper lip, in addition to his facial features, eyes, nose, eyebrows, mouth (the lower lip overbites the upper lip) all squeezed together to the center that limited his expressions to the least. What we saw was an unwelcoming face like a poorly designed mask. He in this film just looked like a deadbeat, passionless zombie. So making Maren, played by Candice Bergen, to love him without any reservation was just so impossible to swallow. Gerald A. Browne always made his heroines in his novels a headstrong, iron-willed, smart and tough ladies, never gave a damn to almost anything, a female far superior to her counterparts, i.e., either their boyfriends or husbands. All the fantastic and amazing heists were almost carried through by their female intelligence and abnormally high I.Q. Candice Bergen to play Maren was a pretty good cast but partnered with the lousy Charles Grodin was just a unmatchable waste. What a shame. James Mason played the important inside man who suffered terminal cancer was a good cast job, but again, the lousy script didn't allow him to show more of his talent.During the final car chase, so many bullets hit the van, but none of them even hit the rear tires. The chase cars explosions were just laughable. Riding horses to chase high speed car....Are you kidding me?!If compares this film with the other film, "Green Ice", also adapted from Mr. Browne's novel, the latter was far better than this 11 Harrowhouse. All the ingredients were there both in the novel and the film, the budget based upon what we've seen in this film, would be also quite sufficient, but it's just like the main theme in this film, about Diamonds, this film looked just like a poorly cut diamond, making it worthless.

After so many years, I need to acquire a copy of this movie. I was ten years old when I saw it at (what is now) America's oldest drive-in theater (1934), Shankweiler's, in Orefield, Pa. near Allentown (this drive-in theater is still open during the summer and I encourage all enthusiasts and movie buffs to support it).I remember enjoying watching it and as the years have gone by, I seem to imagine that it was even better than I remembered it. I do recall Grodin's voice-over giving me the biggest laughs, and other moments of tension and timing during the heist made it all the more charming.I did have a crush on the younger Candace Bergen and I'm eager to see what she looked like back then. I am curious to see whether or not the 36 years in between will alter my opinion of the movie.

I laughed through this years ago, and have looked for copies on video and then on DVD over the years. Why is this one of my all time favorite movies like "Sneakers"? It is the poor, trod upon common man trying to outsmart "the establishment". Charles Grodin mentions in his autobiography, "It Would Be So Nice If You Weren't Here" that this movie needs a crowd to pick up on the humor and make it infectious. The original reviewer watched a private screening and dead-panned it. That was the review the movie houses used to base their order on, so it had a two week run and was gone before word could get around. (Did you see "My Big, Fat Greek Wedding in the first two weeks it was out? No, it needed time for word to spread) If you are in a bit of a silly mood with a group of friends and feel like watching someone thumb their nose at 'them with the power' with a fun twist at the end, this can make for a fun evening.

This could have been a fairly entertaining caper movie, but it never comes to life. It has a promising cast, but most of the performers are given nothing to do; James Mason brings the only traces of humanity to an otherwise very mechanical movie. In the last 15 minutes, the filmmakers even throw in some car chases and shoot-outs, probably hoping that the movie would gain some tension (since there are no laughs), but it remains strangely indifferent and uninvolving throughout. (**)