Critic Reviews

It’s a film no one really demanded and yet is loads of fun.

Thanks to Schweighöfer’s stylish, Italian Job-influenced directing, a sense of its own ridiculous nature and some fabulous performances by the charming and good-looking supporting cast, Army of Thieves is the very definition of an entertaining Netflix confection.

Army of the Dead is a film full of pleasant surprises, but Matthias Schweighöfer, playing a German safecracker with a hair-trigger for impassioned speeches about locks and bolts, is perhaps the most pleasant surprise of them all.

The storytelling overall is less sophisticated, leaning a little too often on strained humor, but this is a slick, enjoyably playful entertainment.

Army of Thieves is content to dig into its heist DNA over everything else (including, unfortunately, the rom-com sensibility it seeks between Sebastian and Gwendoline). That means unique, clever heists on a fast rotation, big twists, and major revelations, and some genuinely accomplished chase scenes.

It's a lot of fun, until it becomes clear that making jokes about heist movies is not the same as actually making a good heist movie.

Lacking Snyder’s directorial dab hand, Army of Thieves is still a fun heist movie that makes an already likeable character even better.

Army of Thieves is one of those bombastically blithe and fanciful Netflix action movies, in this case with a romantic heart.

There’s nothing markedly necessary about universe expander Army of Thieves, niche fan service that gives backstory to a character who we know dies later on, but Schweighöfer, also acting as director, keeps his frothy caper afloat with a light knockabout tone, never insisting the film as anything that it isn’t.

Army of Thieves isn't the most original or inventive heist movie you'll ever see; but it's a massively entertaining expansion of Zack Snyder's undead cinematic universe.