Rating: 
Summary: Some of these reviewers must be watching another movie!!!!
Review: This is a good film, not his best, but it isn't terrible. In fact, I kind of enjoyed it. There are some great lines, and I like the talent of Jon Lovitz. This film is about a heist to rob money from a bank. It is camoflaged because it is on the side of a cookie shop Ray (Allen) used to divert attention away. Woody gets friends and family to work at the shop; the heist falls through, but the shop is a hit! This film is clever and funny. If you haven't seen it, do yourself a favor...
Rating: 
Summary: A minor Woody Allen effort made notable by Elaine May
Review: When you learn that Woody Allen made a film with Tracy Ullman as his leading lady, then you say to yourself that you would like to see that movie. But when you are finished watching "Small Time Crooks" the two people you are probably going to be talking about the most are Elaine May and Elaine Stritch, who pretty much steal every single scene in which they appear in this film. However, this makes sense, because "Small Town Crooks" is a film where about five minutes in your figure out what the twist is going to be, but then you discover that is going to be the first of several twists that keep you spinning around from start to finish in this film. Allen's nebish this time around is Ray Winkler, a former crook who conceives of a self-admittedly "brilliant" plan for robbing a bank, which requires his wife, the former exotic dancer "Frenchy" Fox, to open up a cookie store as a front while Ray and his bumbling buddies attempt to execute his master plan so he and Frenchy can go to Florida and live the good life that has so long elluded them.
"Small Town Crooks" is certainly a break from Woody Allen's usual fare in recent years, but it ends up being a second tier comedy for the writer-director (operationally define as a film you watch once and determine that is enough). I also came to the conclusion, given Allen's tendency to work improvisationally, that all of the great lines spouted by Elaine Mae came from her own fertile comedic mind. This does not take away from the disappointment of not seeing Ullman finally go long on the big screen, but it is certainly a source of solace. I also would not have minded seeing more of Allen's version of the gang that couldn't do nuttin' right, made up of actors Michael Rapaport, Tony Darrow, and John Lovitz. Still, "Small Time Crooks" does provide another example of Allen in an optimistic mood, albeit on a minor level.
Rating: 
Summary: A Great Comedy By Woody Allen!
Review: This movie is downright silly, and I loved every second of it! It's good to see Woody Allen writing, directing, and acting in a comedy movie. So much has been made about this man's personal life that people forget his professional talents.Woody Allen and Tracy Ullman play a husband and wife in the style of Fred & Ethel Mertz of "I Love Lucy". They constantly bicker at each other, but it still remains an obviously loving relationship. As the movie begins, Allen's character, Ray, is an ex-con who works as a dish washer, and Ullman plays his manicurist wife, Frenchy. They have exactly $6,000 between them, and they've decided to pool their money with other partners in order to execute a plan to rob a bank. They rent a storefront that neighbors the bank and plan on digging a tunnel from the store to inside the bank's vault. The storefront is turned into a cookie shop as a cover for their operation. The bank robbery idea goes sour, but ironically, the cookie shop flourishes, and the next thing you know, Ray and Frenchy are heading up their own giant cookie corporation. Frenchy decides that she'd like to join the ranks of the classy elite, so she buddies with an art dealer (played by Hugh Grant) and asks him to teach her how to live a lifestyle of affluence. Ray wants no part of this lifestyle, and his relationship with Frenchy begins to suffer. By the end of the movie, their cookie empire crumbles and Frenchy finds out that the art dealer is using her for her money, so Ray and Frenchy must come together again to salvage some money and escape to Florida. All of this seems like alot to cram into a movie that's only 95 minutes long, but it all happens very fast, and in a very comical way. Woody Allen and Tracy Ullman are great in their roles, and the supporting cast complements them very nicely. This movie is a definite must-see.
Rating: 
Summary: Nothing.
Review: I have never been able to watch a whole Woody Allen movie. This one took two sittings, but I was determined to see at least one thru to the end. And what was the point? The only reason I was able to was because of Tracey Ullman and Hugh Grant. Woody Allen is so aggravating with his ranting and raving and complaining. It's jut not funny. I didn't laugh one time, kept waiting for a punch line or something. Nothing. This movie has nothing to offer for the movie goer. I think he keeps making movies so actors can add Woody Allen to their resumes.
Rating:
Summary: One of Allen's best in recent years
Review: Ray and Frenchy (Woody Allen and Tracey Ullman) try to rob a bank but inadvertantly earn an honest fortune in the attempt. Their marraige becomes strained when Frenchy tries to grow into the role of a cultured New York society matron while Ray pines for the simple pleasures he once enjoyed. The dialogue is sharply written by Allen, who surrounds himself with a wonderful cast. This is one of his minor films, but it is very enjoyable. There are not too many big laughs but lots of smiles.
Rating:
Summary: A Good, Small-Time Movie
Review: This movie has a cast of very funny people such as Woody Allen and Jon Lovitz. This movie lacks suspense and a little bit of drama. But for a small movie such as "Small Time Crooks" it was really good.
Rating:
Summary: It works and it's funny.
Review: Instead of the usual Upper West Side pseudo intellectual dorks of endless previous Woody Allen yarns, this one revolves around Hell's Kitchen low lives, Frenchie (Tracey Ullman) and Ray (Woody Allen)and their accidental climb up the social ladder.
Frenchie's transformation from tenament dweller to Upper East Side art's matron is hysterical in that she doesn't change at all, only her surroundings do.
One problem with the writing is the character of Ray, who is suppose to be a dim wit, but falls out of character every time he makes a wise crack that is too wise for such a dunce.
Woody Allen is great at capturing the vanity and self absorbtion of New Yorkers and how they never really see themselves objectively.
The cast is great. Elaine May steals all the scenes she is in. Her character, May, is so dense that she needs a set of fog lights to form a logical sentence. Her scene at the party hosted by a society matron, played with perfection by Elaine Stritch, is an instant classic. The message: Lessons are learned, but ignorance is bliss.
Rating:
Summary: Literate Comedy
Review: SMALL TIME CROOKS (2000), dir. Woody Allen (and written of course) In this one Woody Allen plays a dumb crook-a dumb person period. He is not his usual wise-cracking, self-centered intellectual egotist (the writer of Deconstructing Harry, for instance), but a low-brow, down-trodden, inept crook-who used to rob banks but who now lives on the minimum wages of his manicurist wife Frenchy (Tracy Ullman), an ex-strip-tease dancer. Ray Winkler
(Allen) needs money for his heist-he and his buddies plan to rob a bank, and they need a front, a shop next to the bank. While the tunnel they dig ends up in a dress shop, the front flourishes thanks to the irresistible flavor of Frenchy's cookies. Lines of customers reaching the heart of Manhattan, television crews, lights, publicity besiege French's little establishment, while the small time crooks' scheme ends up an appalling flop. The story of Frenchy's and Ray's rise has more twists and turns than a Hitchcockian plot, but the audacity of this little film somewhat redeems the improbability (and momentary silliness) in it. For one thing, lowlifes and failed crooks seem to have more wit and pronounce more bon-mots than anything else spoken on the screen these days, when wit has been replaced a hundred per cent by foul language. The f... word that seems to have dominated the screens of America is not once heard here, despite all the fuss about the vulgarity of these characters. This is a truly funny movie, for all that it is worth, despite the literarily derived moral tale-of Pygmalion and Galatea: Ullman, who reads Shaw's Pygmalion in one scene, gets hold of a mentor, David (Hugh Grant), when her cookie empire makes her a wealthy woman, but one without the graces of taste and culture. She is a Born Yesterday character, except that in this one, it's the wife rather than the husband that takes the initiative to social elevation. Grant, who is, of course, a small time crook in his own right, is out to get Frenchy's wealth by following the well-known (to him) getting-culture path. As she rises to his level of intellect and sophistication she, he assumes, will tire of Ray's propensity for cheeseburgers rather than sautéed sparrows on lettuce, find her husband too tedious and switch over to him. He counts on getting her money, and makes plans accordingly. When her empire crashes (she naively left the conducting of her business to crooked accountants who took off for Venezuela), Grant reaches for his Valium pills and drops her like a rotten apple. Meanwhile, Ray has been plotting a robbery of his own-and when that fails, he and Frenchy get back together. They leave for Miami planning to live on the proceeds of a diamond tobacco case that Frenchy had bought for David, managing to swindle him at the last moment. All's well that ends well, and this one wins. Lots of laughs from Allen who proves adept being inept. He pulls this one off with the dexterity of a veteran actor, writer, and director-now, for a change, proving his main character more entertaining by making him dumb. The movie isn't, though. Some plaudits should have been given here-and Allen may re-think his persona (not his ultimate persona), for a change. This is a talented filmmaker who makes the best possible movie with the most limited means. Imagine what would happen if Allen decided-and was provided the means-to make an epic! Not a mock-epic like Love and Death , or a Gladiator type, but, let's say, War and Peace. Let him loose, Hollywood. Take advantage of his uncanny ways, great wit, camera inventions, literacy, and reckless sense of adventure.
Rating:
Summary: It's Funny, It's Charming,It Must Be 1975!
Review: A return to 1970s form for Woody Allen? No, it's just a return to his 1970s idiom, the broad, New York comedy, albeit revised and refined a little since those days. The casting of this director can sometimes seem repetitive, as we see the same faces appear again and again in his films, however he manages to inject new life here with Tracey Ullman and Hugh Grant, neither of whom is exactly challenged by the material. But it's good fun. You see Allen waving his hands about in parallel whilst talking about his neuroses, and there's a crime of the century caper plot to keep the jokes coming. The real casting question is, how long can Allen continue to play the slightly nerdy, romantically unfulfilled intellectual he was playing when he was twenty. I think you know the answer!
Rating:
Summary: In the first half, Woody is in top comic form
Review: The World Trade Center tragedy makes movie-watching seem patently frivolous, but somehow the more serious the movie the more frivolous it seems. Perhaps the films that offer the greatest distance from the September 11th events are musicals and comedies. So last night I watched Woody Allen's "Small Time Crooks." The first half ranks with his funniest movies. But as they say in show biz, you gotta have a second act. Allen's recent films have had powerful first acts but flopped in the second act. I'm thinking about films such as "Bullets Over Broadway," "Mighty Aphrodite," "Stardust Memories," "Deconstructing Harry," and "Small Time Crooks." The premise of the latter is well-known; you can't miss it even on the video or DVD box. Woody and pals set out to rob a bank by tunneling under a rented shop next to the bank; to keep up the front, Woody's wife (Tracey Ullman) sells cookies; but the cookies become a hit, get franchised, and Woody and co. become filthy rich. This all happens, presumably, before they finish digging the tunnel. Act One is lively and quick; indeed, more rapid-fire than any previous Allen comedy that I can remember. This is largely due to Tracey Ullman, who Allen said was the funniest person he's ever worked with. Her comic timing is flawless, almost as good as Carole Lombard. (Still, in my book Ullman isn't really as funny as Diane Keaton, who may not have been as zippy but whose facial expressions in films such as "Love and Death" and "Annie Hall" were simply over the top. Years later one can remember her facial expressions even as the movie is forgotten, like the grin of the Cheshire cat.) When Woody and Tracey turn nouveau-riche, the Second Act begins and withers away. Making fun of the nouveau riche is easy, but Allen needed a script writer who could take the humor beyond the obvious. The best part of the Second Act is Hugh Grant's turn as a con man for Ullman seeking a crash course in aesthetics. He's very good in this role, although not nearly as good or funny as Michael Caine in "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels"--a delightful movie through and through.) People have said that the more films Allen turns out, the more one appreciates his early comedies. In fact, a student says this of Allen himself in "Stardust Memories." I think it's true. "Annie Hall" must reign as the most accomplished film. The funniest, I think, are "Love and Death" and "Bananas," with "Sleeper" a close third. "Play it Again Sam" has a better plot than these, and may come in second to "Annie Hall" for the all-around award. Many of Allen's early movies owe their success to editor Ralph Rosenblum', who took the various "bits" that Allen filmed and strung them together into feature-length movies. It seems to me that Allen has unfairly played down Rosenblum's contribution. But Allen's films have suffered ever since Rosenblum left. Allen is a good director, but when he supervises the editing he lacks objectivity--a common fault among directors who insist on editing or on having the final cut. That being said, I have to concede that the first half of "Small Time Crooks" was very well edited; it's as if Allen's editing is improving with on-the-job training. Still, he lost it in the second act.
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