"LEVERAGE: THE 1ST SEASON"
DVD Review
by Kevin Carr
| MOVIE: ***1/2 (out of 5 stars)
DVD EXPERIENCE: ***1/2 (out of 5 stars) STARRING Timothy Hutton as NATHAN FORD Christian Kane as ELIOT SPENCER Aldis Hodge as ALEC HARDISON Gina Bellman as SOPHIE DEVEREAUX Beth Riesgraf as PARKER Not Rated Studio: TNT Back to DVD Review Home |  |
WHAT IT’S ABOUT
Nathan Ford (Timothy Hutton) is an ex-insurance investigator who is hired to help pull a Robin Hood style heist. In order to do so, he contacts several of the thieves he had apprehended back in the day to assemble the perfect con-and-steal dream team. After a successful first job, they go into business together as the Leverage Corporation, which pulls huge con jobs but only on the bad guys.
WHAT I LIKED
I’ve always enjoyed a good heist movie, and the show’s creators mention in the special features that they wanted to create a grand heist television show. Although a nice allotment of heist movies have been made over the years (including the Oceans films, “The Bank Job” and “The Italian Job”), it really hasn’t caught on as a hugely profitable genre.
On television, “Leverage” works great. In many ways, it reminds me of “Burn Notice,” which was a similar show that was only so-so at the start but soon grew on me to become one of my must-see series. The whole Robin Hood angle is the best way to present thieves as the good guys. And there are plenty of bad guys to go after in the series – from corporate back-stabbers and greedy businessmen to international villains and terrorist supporters.
Timothy Hutton is the anchor of the show, but the real spark in this series is from his team. Gina Bellman, whom many will recognize from the BBC show “Coupling,” plays the love interest for Nathan and serves as the chameleon con girl who can play any part and almost any ethnicity. Eliot Spencer (Christian Kane) is the ex-military tough guy whose specialty is weapons and fighting. He’s rocking a Brad Pitt quality with the long hair and serves well as eye candy for the ladies.
However, my personal favorites are Alec Hardeson (Aldis Hodge), the tech geek of the group who is a whiz at computers. You always need one of these characters in a good team show. He serves well as a hipper version of Chloe from “24” or Marshall from “Alias.” Rounding out the cast is Parker (Beth Riesgraf), an antisocial thief who has no fear and a large dose of psychosis. Riesgraf is cute but not gorgeous, although she does her best to be the Fiona of this series, for those who will understand the “Burn Notice” reference.
So far, throughout the first season, the heist-of-the-week hasn’t gotten old, and it leaves plenty of room for expansion in the upcoming seasons.
WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE
In such a well-designed group of characters, the biggest roadblock is Hutton himself. His character of Nathan Ford is constantly pining over the death of his son, which happens in his backstory. Consequently, he drinks away his feelings, making him only really interesting when he’s leading the heist. Hopefully they’ll temper his character in upcoming seasons so he’s not such a brooding (and in those moments, over-acting) of a person.
DVD FEATURES
In addition to the thirteen episodes of the first season, the DVD set comes with deleted scenes on each episode (conveniently presented on the same disc as the episode itself). There’s also a selection of featurettes, including “Leverage: Behind the Scenes,” “Anatomy of a Stunt Fight” and “The Cameras of Leverage.”
There’s also two cute bonus features, one showing how Executive Producer Dean Devlin punked the cast by casually revealing they got renewed, and the other showing Beth Riesgraf spoofing a crazy actress.
WHO’S GOING TO LIKE THIS MOVIE
Fans of the heist genre.
