As one grows older, they begin to learn that the world is not always that kind to the elderly – there’s a sense of respect and admiration, but at some point, you are essentially labelled as being past the point of functional member of society, and set out to pasture, told to enjoy the remaining years of your life in ways that may seem peaceful, but ultimately tend to be quite unexciting. However, many of the elderly would rebel against this idea, choosing to highlight the extent to which they are actually capable of much more than society would think. This is the premise that Cláudio Torres uses to construct Old Bandits (Portuguese: Bandidos Velhos), an offbeat dark comedy that directly addresses the trials and tribulations faced by the senior community, being both heartfelt and bitingly funny. The film introduces us to Sid and Nancy, a pair of petty thieves who run a very profitable scam: Nancy works at a travel agency, selling expensive cruises to wealthy elderly people. Once she is sure that they have embarked on their journey, Sid joins her in tracking down the addresses of these clients, raiding their homes for everything that they’re worth, secure in the knowledge that it’ll be a couple of weeks before they return, by which point all evidence will likely be invalid. However, they meet their match with Marta and Rodolfo, who just so happened to have forgotten their passports, catching the burglars in the act. However, rather than falling victim to their manipulations, Marta and her husband prove to be unexpectedly knowledgeable about criminal activity, revealing their own carefully-plotted plan to rob a bank, which Sid and Nancy are forced to join, or else face years in prison. As strange and unconventional as its premise suggests, while also not neglecting the necessary heart and soul needed to make this story work, Old Bandits is a delight, a peculiar gem of a film that may not be all that original, but is certainly entertaining enough to make up for any narrative or technical constraints.
Old Bandits is a film built on that well-worn cliché where the elderly are initially presented as absent-minded and feeble, based around the very traditional perception of the older members of our society not having the mental or physical capacity of their younger counterparts, only for the rug to be pulled from beneath our feet as we discover that they are just as resourceful and cunning as those decades younger than them. There are plenty of films constructed from this premise, and Old Bandits is just the most recent addition to this canon of unexpected portraits of the senior community – in this case, they’re presented as master thieves planning a bank heist, which has decades of similarly-themed stories on which it can build its premise, which proves to be unsurprisingly very entertaining, even if it is quite obvious where every narrative beat is going. Torres approaches the material from a place of exploring a few key themes – ageing being the primary focus- particularly in how the story examines the contentious relationship between two couples, one being arrogant enough to think that their youthfulness and awareness of the modern world make them far more insightful about how society functions than the other couple, who have not only grown wise in their old age, but have also very much lost any interest in the opinions of others, especially those who make a living through exploiting the weak and vulnerable. As far as thematic inventory goes, Old Bandits is certainly very straightforward, with the battle of the wits between the core quartet (each one a distinct character in their own right) giving Old Bandits an increased sense of sincerity as well as a very conventional structure, which is perfect for the kind of film that is being made here. It’s not particularly innovative, but it never claims to be. Instead, it functions as a relatively conventional comedy that does manage to touch on a few deeper themes in a vibrant and truly meaningful way.
Those expecting anything even vaguely innovative should look elsewhere, since Old Bandits is about as conventional as a film like this could be, which is entirely by design. At no point does Torres indicate his desire to do anything even vaguely experimental with this material, especially since it was evidently a much smaller production, based on the clearly limited resources with which they had to work. This is a film that focused on telling a simple story, and one that was never aiming to be anything more than what it presented itself as at the outset. This doesn’t change the fact that it is still very entertaining, even at its most obvious. I would argue that Old Bandits is mostly going to be appreciated by those who don’t crave overly complex, didactic storytelling, and instead can surrender to a more predictable kind of comedy where we can anticipate every step, but where it ultimately does not make much of a difference, since the film is nothing if not wholeheartedly entertaining. This does ultimately mean there’s a lot of derivative elements in the film, and the flaws are very much prominent. Primarily, the film struggles to temper its emotions all that effectively – one scene will be hilariously scathing, filled with biting humour and some truly cutting remarks, whereas the next will be filled to the brim with sickly-sweet sentimentality (for those who are against saccharine comedies that lean towards being emotionally quite dense, you should approach this film with an abundance of caution), not to mention the fact that there are at least half a dozen moments in the final act where we believe the film has reached its climax, only for yet another layer to be revealed. Some character motivations are questionable, and there are far too many inconsistent aspects of the story, which can be extremely frustrating. Yet, we cannot help but be enchanted by Old Bandits, which works through all of these shortcomings and delivers something so much more engaging in a way that is nothing if not wholeheartedly well-intentioned and genuinely very fun, even at its most predictable.
I would suspect that the primary reason Old Bandits was even made (let alone having some cultural prominence) comes down to the presence of Fernanda Montenegro, who plays one of the two key roles in the film. As inarguably the greatest living actor to come from Brazil, she’s had a long and storied career on stage and screen – and as she nears her hundredth year, we grow increasingly more grateful for every opportunity to see her act. Despite being much older, Montenegro is as spry and charismatic as ever, the spark of mischief in her eye not having faded, nor has her pure magnetism that has drawn so many viewers towards her work. Her performance in Old Bandits is very simple, tailored to her specific set of talents – it makes sense that the director is her son, who very carefully creates a character suited to match her skills, highlighting her extraordinary charisma in a way that is nothing if not genuinely very compelling. However, we also can’t dismiss another legend of the screen in the form of Ary Fontoura, who is paired with Montenegro, delivering an equally committed performance as a man holding onto the limited time he has left, making the best of the situation. The two leads have extraordinary chemistry, proving that decades of honing your craft has exceptional results, especially when delivering performances that feel this earnest and authentic. We can’t necessarily dismiss Bruna Marquezine and Vladimir Brichta, who round out the core quartet, but any young actor would gladly defer to being secondary when working across from two major icons of the industry. They deliver strong performances that may not be as polished (and their characters are certainly not as well-crafted), but have a subtle charm that we can at least appreciate, even if the performances are not always as strong as their more established colleagues, who are almost the entire reason to seek out this film.
When it comes to a film like Old Bandits, what you see is what you get, since this is the kind of film that doesn’t do anything particularly revolutionary or daring, but instead works on the simpler premise of delivering exactly what it promises on the surface, in the hopes that the audience will be able to understand precisely what it intends to communicate. For this reason alone, the film will be somewhat divisive – for some viewers, it’ll be an effortlessly entertaining romp that skirts around some complex ideas, whereas for others, it’ll be nothing more than a trite triviality of a film, a well-meaning comedy that has good intentions but subpar execution. Regardless of where one finds themselves on this issue, its clear that there is something more to be said about this film than many of us will readily admit, and the gradual deconstruction of its key ideas do tend to be mostly effective, as long as we don’t expend too much energy trying to make sense of the film beyond what is immediately visible. It may not be particularly challenging, but it never claims to be – and ultimately what it lacks in originality it more than makes up for in terms of pure heart and soul, which is all that was needed to capture our attention. It’s a solid, well-crafted comedy that me not always have the strongest resource, and some elements may not work (for example, some of the dialogue is very cheap and overly-reliant on exposition, which can be very frustrating considering it’s not telling a very complex story), but it’s all forgiven when we realise the kind of film we are watching, gradually and methodically working our way through a simple but effective comedy that doesn’t say anything we don’t already know, but still find to be very entertaining, particularly when we look beyond the trite narrative and focus instead on its more endearing and warm intentions.
