This should have confirmed Jason Statham’s upward career mobility: it’s fabled screenwriter William Goldman’s second big-screen pass at his own novel Heat, which sees the Stath, assuming a sometime Burt Reynolds role as a Vegas gambler who falls foul of the mob, trading lines (if not blows) with a half-dozen or so legit performers. It emerges, alas, as a compromise, hedging its bets between cheery, characterful Ocean’s-ish caper and brute-force beat-’em-up; we’re offered helpings of both, but not enough of either to satisfy. Notable faces (Sofia Vergara, Jason Alexander, Anne Heche) vanish without a trace, and Jase struggles with Goldman’s distinctly American, hard-boiled dialogue. Pity.
