Movies: Dandy Dodgy Lodgers

Band of Bozos? The Fellowship of the Dingbats? Dawn of the Brain Dead? Something along those lines might be a more telling title for The Ladykillers, wherein the Coen brothers merrily subvert that standard caper trope in which a bunch of guys tunnel their way toward a large cache of cash and, naturally, an even larger concluding irony.

The film is a very loose, very Americanized remake of the Alec Guinness comedy of 1955, with which it shares a title, a basic situation and not much else. Tom Hanks--sporting a goatee, a white suit and a mellifluous Southern accent--expertly essays...

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