What’s The Worst That Could Happen?

Though a caper comedy that runs for only 95 minutes is welcome, this movie manages to go from funny to formulaic in considerably less time than that. Martin Lawrence plays a professional Boston burglar, and Danny DeVito is the sleazy billionaire he burgles. When Lawrence is caught, DeVito takes his revenge by stealing a ring from Lawrence that his new girlfriend (Carmen Ejogo) gave him; the remainder of the movie is a protracted grudge match between the two, told with absolutely no sense of urgency. Screenwriter Matthew Chapman, adapting a Donald E. Westlake novel, does a pretty good job of stuffing comic grotesques into the crevices of the plot, but director Sam Weisman doesn’t handle them with much grace. With John Leguizamo, Glenne Headly, Nora Dunn, and William Fichtner. (JR) Read more