Quartile rating: 6.5/10 · 1 rating
A loser of a crook and his wife strike it rich when a botched bank job's cover business becomes a spectacular success.
Small Time Crooks is a pleasant but minor Woody Allen comedy that leans on a clever premise — a failed robbery whose cookie-shop front becomes an accidental empire — but doesn't push it very far. Allen and Tracey Ullman are charming together and the ensemble delivers reliable laughs, though the film never rises to Allen's best work. Visually it's functional and unremarkable, shot with the competent but unambitious style of late-period Allen. The plot pivots interestingly into a social-climbing satire in its second half, but the two halves feel somewhat uneven. The ending wraps things up neatly if without much surprise. A likable, lightweight effort that sits comfortably in the middle of the Allen catalogue.