He was the leader that he is. She prepped for that for God knows how long. But it really wasnt. Every large theft needs an inside man, but Inside Man (2006), directed by Spike Lee, had Clive Owen as a bona fide genius. Affleck said he picked up the term from a guy at New Sullys bar:I asked, Whats the thing with the Tunies? And he said the Tunies moved in and the Townies stole all their car stereos. They had all these Blaupunkts. And its absolutely authentic. This was a garage that Its more general American but with a kind of East Coast, sort of slightly privileged vibe. The bank robbers step out of their vehicle. Hamm: Theres nothing weirder than an empty stadium. Yes Charestown, MA is known for Bank robbers. Its like 50 percent of why people buy tickets. So if you give somebody a space, all they want to do is figure out how to do a heist in there. And they walked me over to this locked door and once you opened it, there was an old, dusty cobwebby circular staircase. The cunning group is robbing city banks to steal money and making the getaway with diamond Heist. Job Type:Part-Time. Tyre marks matched those found in Houston, and five men were eventually convicted. After shooting one guard outside the car and one inside the bank, they escaped in a rental truck. Ill do that., My place in Connecticut is only three hours from Boston, so I just, on a whim, jumped in the car, drove up to Boston, went to the production office and walked in, and David Crockett, one of the producers, and Chay were like, Hey, what are you doing? And I said to Chay, Oh, Im Detective such and such. And she was like, You fucker. I said, Is he here? And she said, Yeah, hes down doing auditions downstairs., I kind of slipped in and waited in line and then said to the production assistant, Dont say my name. Even with the shorter length hes afforded, Affleck tells multiple stories. He goes, Yeah, you know, Ill tell you, Ty. And everyone was like, Ah, you cant, really. Blake Lively was sent into bars, real hoodlums were cast and a wedding party was spooked by gunfire. You can come over to my house for dinner. It was just short of, If you need protection, were here for you. It was incredible. Its not The Godfather of caper films, but it is a heist movie must-see. He gets punished. I just still really thought that way. The only time I attempt it is when Im basically making fun of Ben, his character, about the Stah Mahket. Those are the blueprints, thats the template. Affleck: The Bruins have been extremely shortsighted and wrong with their policy, where if theres swearing or violence, you cant use their logo. When I was a kid, I was scared to go there. In Black Mass, Johnny Depp plays South Boston mobster James Whitey Bulger, an Irish gangster who informed on the Italian mob to the FBI. Hes probably still there. Culture Editor Tony Sokol is a writer, playwright and musician. I feel like were still in the black. The Town captures the locale expertly, and the atmosphere masterfully. WebDoug MacRay (Ben Affleck) is an unrepentant criminal, the de facto leader of a group of ruthless bank robbers who pride themselves in stealing what they want and getting out clean. [1] Originally called Mishawumby the Massachusetttribe, it is located on a peninsulanorth of the Charles River, across from downtown Boston, and also adjoins the Mystic Riverand Boston Harborwaterways. They look at him. Welliver: I had an experience several years before for a David Kelley show called The Practice which took place in Boston. Affleck: Those little streets created something visually interesting that you dont see in many car chases. But not everyone was happy with the image of Charlestown given toa generation of moviegoers. The second thing was, I realized what a fool I was to think like, Oh, if its bad Ill have a story. I realized that I wouldve been crushed if that movie was bad. The feds, they get shuffled around all over the country. But what about in the 1980s and early 1990s? Iran. Date Updated: Jan 18, 2023. It all felt sort of very impossible and glamorous. I was up there for what Im sure was a good half hour. 2 hours ago. Adrian had wanted to do one of my books, which was kind of unadaptable because it took place over like, 30 years. Theres something so tomb-like and archaic about Fenway. After managing to evade a manhunt and escape to Florida, his character says goodbye to Claire via a letter. When youre underneath in the concourse space, you could drop a keg at one end of the ballpark and have it reverberate all the way around. R Thriller Drama Crime Movie 2010. hd. Most of the heists in The Town were inspired by real crimes from that era. The Telegraph values your comments but kindly requests all posts are on topic, constructive and respectful. Afflecks big killing in The Town is Fenway Park, and over 60 years later, the take is the same. The Cambridge native and his crew were back in Charlestown last week re-shooting an alternative ending to the bank robber thriller. Hamm: It was impressive. But he also liked this book by Chuck Hogan. Hogan: Dick Wolf from Law & Order somehow read [the book] early. But it couldnt be Bruins. And I was like, Who the hell is this guy? Hamm: I had also seen Dahmer. Welliver: If anything, people were kind of burned out on the New York gangster genre. I dont even think they had sidewalks. Heres how it works in fucking Charlestown: Youre born in Charlestown, you play fucking hockey and you rob. And I went, OK, that sums it up.. Heist movies are filled with criminals who want to pull one last big job and settle down. So unexpected. The Town unfolds in the Boston neighborhood of Charlestown, which the prologue claims has produced more bank robbers and armored car thieves than Walking in I was feeling kind of glib. Honestly, people just wouldnt have liked the movie [with my ending]. Al Pacinos Sonny in Dog Day Afternoon wants enough money to give a better life to his wives. The Den of Geek quarterly magazine is packed with exclusive features, interviews, previews and deep dives into geek culture. And hes like, Wheres that from? And shes like, Oh, he was here. I wanted to be a part of that. Affleck: The only other thing Ill say about the chase sequence, it definitely reminded me of Jimmy Tingle in the 80s. Burke: Ive heard people say, Oh, we dont sound like that! And Im like, I dont think you guys really listen to yourselves. And I got a call saying that [Fatal Attraction and Indecent Proposal director] Adrian Lyne had read it and really wanted to do something with it. The city also set the scene for Clint Eastwoods Mystic River, and Afflecks directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone, both based on books by local crime novelist Dennis Lehane. Slaine (Albert Gloansy Magloan): I was born in Dorchester, grew up there as a kid. IS Charlestown MA known for Bank robbers? This is based on FBI statistics at the time. He set the bar with those filmsyou [must] reach a modicum of the depth and the artistry of those films if youre going to do a Boston film. It has a failed romance, a foiled heist, an unsolved crime, enough car chases for three movies, and yet is a coming-of-age film and a portrait of an eras end. And to that end, its 100 percent on Ben. It has a broad appeal. He loved it, optioned it. Welliver: So, when [Jem] gets killed at Fenway, when the cops dump him and [theres] that brilliant thing of him reaching down and taking a sip of the soda behind the mailbox, it was a little bit of, Top of the world, ma! Its heartbreaking. Affleck unequivocally contributed to that proliferation. Los Angles police on high alert for grand theft and planned robbery in town. Owen Burke (Desmond Elden): I was going to a community college in Charlestown, I was working under the table, I had just gotten past some legal trouble in my teenage years. And so if you cant do it, just dont do it. It was concealing a character-based drama centered around themes that I was interested in, particularly the theme of children paying for the sins of their parents, Affleck says. Determined to get a better grip on the place, he brought in another local, his old school friend Stockard, and began an intensive period of research. BOSTON - An infamous criminal, who claims he's robbed more than 100 banks, was arrested in an attempted heist in the Back Bay. I was like, Im not gonna do another movie in Boston. They were about to buy it but they wanted to cut it, too. FINDLAY, Ohio (WTVG) - Authorities arrested a man in Findlay Monday on bank robbery charges. the movie the TOWN WAS Mde after SQUARE OFF T.V 249 subscribers Subscribe 6 Share 1.2K views 1 year Ben Affleck made a minor heist movie classic with The Town, a thriller which shines light on the legendary history of Boston's Charlestown. We all want to drive a f----n caaar like Gloansy. Colin Burch (vice president of marketing and broadcasting, Boston Red Sox): We had filmed a number of movies before at Fenway, starting with Fever Pitch, and we did Ted, and RIPD, and Moneyball. It was wild. U.S. Attorney Michael Connolly said at a news conference at the time, Once Upon a Time in America Is a Movie That Can Never Be Too Long, The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone Proves a Little Less is Infinitely More, Heist Review: Netflix Doc Appreciates That Crime Pays, Shazam! Just because the echo in the ballpark. But as I was signing books afterwards, I see this guy coming up. And then we put her and her cousin in the movie. Hes crazy. Hes from Modesto, and hes kind of got that bulldog, kind of dirtbag sensibility. Slaine: I worked at Fenway Park when I was a kid, so to go in there and be shooting machine guns was pretty cool, pretty surreal. Free shipping for many products! Everybody wanted to cut it. We all want to chortle,like Jem,there goes college soccaaar, while shooting a guy we dont like in the knee. You know, the Kennedys kind of had their own weird accent. I said, Im so sorry to bother you Mr. Postlethwaite, but Im on the movie, sorry we dont have any scenes together, but Im so excited to be in a movie with you. I gushed for a while, and he just smiled as broad as he could, and hes like, Come on, come on, sit down, have a drink. I was like, Well, its 11 in the morning.. As they fled with a bag of cash containing roughly $281,000 (180,000 then), another guard opened fire. It was as simple as that. Salon Professionals. So I was thrilled. Affleck: Im like, Why the fuck do you think people go to hockey games? Swearing and fighting. Its kind of insular. Jason Bourne kills the bad guys. September 2009. Besides being the lovable and erudite wrinkle in the scheme, she is not a townie, someone who was raised in the neighborhood. Im gonna do a movie about Iran.. Agents with the FBI believe Gage Haws robbed five small town banks throughout northwest Ohio. [Lively did not respond to a request to be interviewed for this article. But the sketchy details and the cast of characters sound like a story line from The Friends of Eddie Coyle, a classic movie about low-level wiseguys in the Boston underworld, or the sequel to The Town, the Ben Affleck movie based on a group of Charlestown bank robbers. Affleck: That was fascinating. But it was very real. Jon Hamm (FBI special agent Adam Frawley): I knew he had some serious Boston cred. He heard stories about Charlestowns reputation for bank robberies and its strict code of silence. I said, Look, you know, I understand that youre making this movie about robbers out of Charlestown. Alexander Witt (second-unit director): We talked and we said, Lets do it as classic as possible.. The annual average hovered above 10,000 for the next 15years. After all, there are only so many Massachusetts-set crime stories about Irish American antiheroes that you can tell. Affleck was determined to make sure that his main cast could at least pass as true Massholes. The North End, Bostons Little Italy, is one of the citys smallest, densest, oldest neighborhoods; the asymmetrical Fenway Park, which fits snugly on a single block, is picturesque but impossibly cramped. Shea, 35, Stephen Burke, 42, and Michael OHalloran, 40, were convicted of racketeering, conspiracy, robbery and other offenses Dec. 22 for a series of holdups in New England and Florida. Every take had the same amount of tension and edge but it was just all over the place. It is also quirkily structured, vaguely biographical and personal. He was with his mother. WebWhitey Bulger and his friendss and some of the Charlestown robbers operated from Marshall Street Garage was actually in Winter Hill, Somerville. To get to Charlestown was to live free. The Town was initially supposed to end with Doug paying for his sins with his life. I had a darker ending in it, like a real 70s ending, where Doug dies. I remember the librarians called me the day before, just to confirm. Or why Affleck hired him to play a Charlestown bank robber in his new movie The Town.. Chuck Hogan (author, Prince of Thieves): When the book came out, I was scheduled to do a reading at the Charlestown Public Library. Its worth bearing in mind that these are state-wide statistics, which do not differentiate betweenneighborhoods. The movies center is Charlestown, right across the bridge from the rest of Boston, a legend in illicit locales. Crockett: The Fenway heist was really just a logistical kind of clusterfuck. Published in 2004 and set in the 90s, it follows a team of stick-up men led by Doug MacRay, a washed-up NHL draft pick and recovering addict whose traumatic childhood has led him to follow his incarcerated father into the family business. Hall: Youd be shooting this tiny little intimate scene, Ben and I, and Id look to my left and there were but thousands of people watching the set. Crockett: As he puts it, you have so many fame chips you can use. 1 hospitalized after fire in West Town, CFD says . Craig: Adrian wanted 90 shooting days and $90 [million] to do it. I knew it was one scene and it was gonna be an important scene: [Dougs] relationship with his father. The Town (2010 Jon Hamm and Affleck centers on the Boston neighborhood of Charlestown. In the history of crime, the best crew was headed by John Dillinger. The cunning group is robbing city banks to steal money and making the getaway with diamond Heist. He goes into the family business. According to FBI statistics But how many people, speaking frankly, want to see a movie about a child murderer? Citizens Bank, located at 315 Hanover St., was robbed at 9:10 a.m. and a Santander Bank at 287 Hanover St., was robbed a mere 4 minutes later. Welliver: He said, Hey, weve got great stories in this city that nobodys telling.. And so Adrian developed it for quite some time. Ive been on the force for 20 years and Im not looking for money or anything, but Im originally from Charlestown and I think I could be helpful. Shes like, Well, its really great to talk to you, we do have technical advisers and everything kind of lined up, but if you wanted to drop off a card or something like that. I said, Yeah, yeah, sure, sure. And we had a lot of days for a movie that was relatively inexpensive. Boston Police report arresting Thomas Hickey, 49, of Charlestown, for a Nov. 30 bank robbery on Austin Street in which he allegedly pushed an elderly man who was in line before him out of the way at a teller window.. Police report arresting He has a certain thing in that town. Police figures from 2010 showed that Charlestown accounted for barely 2 per cent of all Boston robberies(not just bank robberies). 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