Handsome Rob (Jason Statham) backs the boat into a slip under a Venice residence and unloads master-thief John (Donald Sutherland) along with apprentice Charlie Croker (Wahlberg), and explosives expert Left Ear (Mos Def) as computer nerd Lyle/Napster (Seth Green) mans his laptop containing 3-D drawings of the residence.

Two stories above, Steve (Ed Norton), paints a small square of explosive on the ceiling after carefully locating it with a laser range finder using radioed instructions from Lyle. We liked the fact that the laser didn't have an easily visible beam but couldn't help wondering about the seemingly close tolerances of the painted area. Meanwhile, Left Ear lines up a similar area of painted explosives one floor below.

When blown, the blast forms amazingly perfect holes which line up exactly with a safe sitting on the third floor and it crashes downward into the boat slip. Seconds later Handsome Rob's boat roars out of the slip with the safe aboard, triggering the standard chase scene by "bad" guys.

But wait, the safe lies underwater in the boat slip. Miraculously, it has fallen into what appears to be nearly crystal clear water without stirring up sediment. While the underwater lighting is dim, John can easily see the numbers on the dial while he cracks the safe. If water clarity were anything like the sediment laden water we have at times dived in, John would not have been able to see the dial's numbers even when pressed against his diving mask.

Sediment not only blurs and obscures whatever one is looking at but also backscatters light. Turn on an underwater spot light and heavy sediment will backscatter the beam, totally blanking out any object the beam is pointed at.

When the police arrive, they fail to detect the thieves below. It must be the reflection of the sunlight inside the covered boat slip that blocks their vision or perhaps they're merely distracted by staring at the hole in the ceilings above them.

When opened, a large bubble escapes from the safe. Evidently, it's not completely water tight or the thieves would never have gotten it open. The pressure would be about 3 psi (0.2 atm) in only 6 feet of water (approximately 2 meters). At this pressure, assuming the door is roughly 2 ft (0.6 meters) wide by 4 ft (1.2 meters) high the force holding the door shut would have been around  3500 lbs (15000 Newtons).

One of the "bad" guys in pursuit proves to be less adroit at steering his boat than Handsome Rob and crashes into the back of a moored craft. The stationary boat just happens to have a ramp on its back side and the Bad guy's boat flies upward through the air before slamming downward to a halt. Meanwhile Handsome Rob escapes along with computer nerd Lyle and the fake safe.

We next see our happy band of hardened criminals riding in a mini-bus-like vehicle with the gold aboard as they travel through snow covered mountains. They pull over to slosh down a bottle of wine each (no designated driver here) as they toast each other and fantasize about how each will spend his newly acquired fortune. John pulls Charlie aside, showers him with praise, and fatherly advice not to mention telling Charlie he loves him. For professional criminals, these are certainly touchy-feely guys.

Alas, Steve restores our faith in criminal behavior and emerges as the group's Judas. (They should have known not to trust a guy with no nick name and dreams for spending his wealth.) He steals the gold and shoots John. In an escape attempt amid a hail of gun-fire, Handsome Rob drives the mini-bus through the side rail and lands it upside-down in a partially frozen lake. It sinks, but don't worry. The plucky band, while jostled about, have SCUBA gear. After emptying his folding stock Kalashnikov assault rifle into the water and waiting till John's body floats to the top, Steve departs.

We then get another touchy feely scene as Charlie weeps over John's frost covered body as it lies on the bank. It's so heart-warming that none of the ice water drenched thieves show any signs of hypothermia let alone shivering.

All this leads to the movie's main plot: stealing the gold back by taking control of the stoplight system in Los Angeles (Steve's new hometown) and using Mini Coopers to escape. This is somewhat reminiscent of the original The Italian Job (1969 British comedy, staring Michael Caine, Benny Hill and Noel Coward). In deference to the original movie, Stella (Charlize Theron) zips around before the final heist in a classic red British Mini, not the BMW Minis which are used later.

Figure 1: Mini Turning in a 6 ft Wide Hall

Minis are supposedly selected for the heist because they're the right size to drive around in the halls of Steve's new mansion. The halls are 6 feet wide (1.8 meters) and evidently have corners rounded with a radius to match the 17.5 foot turning radius of the Minis. Keep in mind that the Minis are nearly 12 feet long and would need to have their side mirrors removed to even fit in the halls ( Minis are 6.32 ft wide with mirrors and 5.54 feet wide without). We know the dimensions because Stella walked around the house wearing a hidden video mini-cam and recorded part of the interior. It seems pretty remarkable that data from a single camera worn by a person randomly walking around a few rooms can be used to accurately dimension a house. Never-the-less, the video was fed into an amazing algorithm which pinpointed distances.

Since the gold carrying Minis were to be used for a fast getaway, their engines were suped-up and suspensions strengthened. It seemed like a good idea but why was only one of the three BMW Mini Coopers an "S" model (the new red one). The "S" model has  a supercharged 163 hp engine which can be boosted to 200 hp with a factory approved performance package. The other two Minis would have 115 hp engines. While even this engine is zippy, and could be boosted with high performance parts it would still be no match for the supercharged 163 hp engine, let alone a suped-up 200 hp model.

The group eventually steals $27,000,000 worth of gold. Using a price of $365 per troy ounce (roughly the average price in 2003. 1Troy ounce = 1/12 pound), this works out to about 2054 pounds (934 kg) of gold per Mini. Considering that a standard Mini Cooper weighs only 2524 and the Mini Cooper S 2678 pounds, 2054 pounds is a lot of weight. The suped-up 200 hp Mini Cooper S would be only slightly better than the standard 115 hp mini from a horsepower to weight ratio.

It's doubtful that even empty Minis could handle the numerous jumps and drops portrayed in the movie and remain drivable, let alone minis with about 60 % more weight. Also human beings dropped from heights do not fair well especially when landing in a seated position. This tends to cause spinal injuries. Even a drop of only 5 or 6 feet ( approximately 2 meters) can be damaging (see our section on falls). Stunt drivers performing car jumps are generally  strapped into specially designed shock absorbing seats for this purpose.

Even with hot Minis to drive it's apparent from the beginning there's no way to get through LA traffic without street light control . Fortunately, the lights are connected in an elaborate computer-controlled, video monitored system designed and operated by morons. The system, evidently, has no safeguards to prevent simultaneous green lights. Apparently there's also no local analog backup if the computer control is lost or else the system's operators are just too dim-witted to turn the computers off  when they've obviously been hacked. To the movie's credit, it does take Napster a few days to break into the stoplight system. This is refreshing compared with the usual Hollywood ten minute hack jobs into high security facilities.

Yes, the movie has a few too many Mini physics flaws. The computer hacking parts are unrealistic and the thieves have all kinds of magical tools such as handheld drills which buzz through solid steel or concrete in a matter of seconds, not to mention radio equipment that works flawlessly even in tunnels (unlike our last cell phone which didn't work in parking lots). However, since we have at least one Mini-maniac among us, we couldn't help liking the movie in Mini ways.