On the other hand. Deadfall suggests that the cat-burglar genre may have only 998 lives. The star of the film is Michael Caine (Alfie, The Ipcress File), who has made a profitable career out of playing ingratiating, low-keyed bounders. This time, he plays an ingratiating, low-keyed jewel thief who creeps up on baubles and boudoirs with equal ingenuity. It is the kind of role that Caine can do in his sleep. The difficulty is that by now much of the audience may be tempted to doze along with him.
Emulating such meticulous metaphysicians of suspense as Graham Greene and John Le Carré,...