33
Much like the lager that gives the film its name, Kidnapping Mr. Heineken is bland on the palette and best pissed away.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
40
Jim Sturgess, Sam Worthington, and True Blood's Ryan Kwanten co-star in this glossy, lifelessly paced edition as three of the criminals, though their underwritten personas and motivations are fairly interchangeable.
40
Arizona Republic by Bill Goodykoontz
The utter lack of surprises and waste of a first-rate cast — Anthony Hopkins as Alfred "Freddy" Heineken; Jim Sturgess and Sam Worthington as kidnappers — make for a tremendous letdown.
38
For all the thematic emphasis the script ultimately places on the allegedly thick bonds among these men, it's surprising how often they communicate solely through exposition.
40
The Hollywood Reporter by Frank Scheck
By the time the relatively brief but seemingly interminable proceedings reach their conclusion, viewers may feel like they've been held hostage themselves.
42
The Playlist by Kevin Jagernauth
Kidnapping Mr. Heineken never conveys how a bunch of working stiffs transformed themselves into a coiled — if scrappy and ragtag — criminal operation.
38
A dull, trite thriller.
40
Kidnapping Mr. Heineken isn’t a comedy of incompetence, or the psychological battle of wills its opening scene suggests. It’s hard to see exactly what the filmmakers were going for, beyond bringing a real-life story to the big screen as dutifully and dully as possible.
75
Anthony Hopkins plays the king of the hops, and he is excellent. So is the rest of the movie, a sober, no-frills account about the highest ransom ever collected up to that time — $10 million and counting.
50
It’s a good looking film, just a tad on the dull and predictable side. But the occasional flash of Hopkins threatens, at several moments, to turn this formulaic true-heist tale into something more psychological, more pathological or at least allegorical. He isn’t really given the chance.