Entrapment



Entrapment is a 1999 action-thriller starring Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta Jones and directed by Jon Amiel. Zeta-Jones stars as Gin, an investigator working for an insurace company. She's hot on the trail of renowned international art thief Mac (Connery), and attempts to trick him into thinking she is herself a thief, and that she wants to team up with him. Together, they embark on the biggest heist ever: stealing $8 billion from the International Clearance Bank, which happens to be housed in the then-tallest buildings in the world, the Petronas Twin Towers.

"Gin: This is entrapment! Mac: No, this is blackmail. Entrapment is what cops do to thieves."
 * Action Girl: Gin.
 * Banned in Malaysia: Despite having been filmed there, the film was banned for portraying the country as backward and its police force as incompetent. At least, it was banned at one time, it was eventually allowed on Pay TV.
 * Black Best Friend: Mac's sidekick is played by Ving Rhames.
 * Blackmail Is Such an Ugly Word: Inverted. Mac gets evidence of Gin helping him, and subtly suggests that she get with the program.


 * Bonnie Scotland: Mac's headquarters is a castle on a Scottish isle.
 * Camera Spoofing: Mac and Gin pause the security camera footage so they can travel in an elevator unnoticed.
 * It doesn't work for long. The building's security are a little stumped for why an elevator would be moving when the camera shows nobody inside. Then Gin's boss points out that the timestamp on the camera is static.
 * The Caper
 * Chekhov's Exhibit: the Chinese mask
 * Classy Cat Burglar: Gin.
 * Dating Catwoman: Gender flipped: Mac is the Catwoman-equivalent,
 * Eiffel Tower Effect: With the Petronas Twin Towers in Malaysia, of course.
 * Every One Remembers the Stripper/Male Gaze: The film is probably most famous for the shot of Catherine Zeta-Jones squirming her ass to the floor to squeeze under a laser tripwire.
 * Fan Service: See above, and also Mac finding Gin naked in her hotel room, and Gin initially making no effort to cover up.
 * Femme Fatale: "Has there ever been a man you couldn't seduce?" "No."
 * Friendly Local Chinatown
 * Gentleman Thief: Mac embodies this.
 * Laser Hallway
 * Literal Cliff Hanger: Mac and Gin dangle from the Petronas Twin Towers' skybridge.
 * Malaysia: The one half of the Petronas Twin Towers is in the poster, and part of the film was shot there.
 * May-December Romance: Sean Connery is 39 years older than Catherine Zeta-Jones.
 * National Stereotypes: The reason it was banned in Malaysia. The film shows Gin and Mac's base of operations in some sort of rural slum that somehow has a brilliant view of the twin towers. To be that close, their ramshackle yurt must have been built atop one of the many affluent skyscrapers and five star hotels.
 * Model Planning
 * Sequel Hook: Gin tells Mac she needs him "for another job". Ten years on though, no sequel in sight. And Sean Connery has retired.
 * Sexy Backless Outfit: Gin's evening gown, and also when she is seen from behind as she sits naked in her bed.
 * Spy Catsuit
 * Stealth Hi Bye: Used often by Mac (and later Gin). Played with at least once when Mac disapears for several seconds before appearing somewhere else, panting because he ran the whole way.
 * The Infiltration: Gin pretends to be a thief in order to catch Mac.
 * Tropes Examined by the Mythbusters: In their Hollywood heist movie episode, the Mythbusters proved that much of the security system-evading techniques shown in the film wouldn't work in real life at all.
 * Turn of the Millennium: The heist takes place on New Year's Eve of 1999-2000.
 * Vehicle Vanish