44 Minutes: The North Hollywood Shoot-Out Back to Index

Imdb Rating: 6.5
Genre: Crime
Directed: Tim Metcalfe (written by)
Country: USA
Year: 2003
Duration: 103 min

Media: Hot stuff

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Actors: Michael Madsen (as Frank McGregor), Ron Livingston (as Donnie Anderson), Ray Baker (as Harris), Douglas Spain (as Bobby Martinez), Andrew Bryniarski (as Larry Eugene Phillips Jr.), Oleg Taktarov (as Emil Matasareanu), Clare Carey (as Frank's Wife), Alex Meneses (as Gomez), Dale Dye (as SWAT Lieutenant), Katrina Law (as Kate), J.E. Freeman (as Police Commander), Mario Van Peebles (as Henry Jones), Jullian Dulce Vida (as Luis Rivera), Gail Monian (as Maria), JoNell Kennedy (as Cathy (as Jo Nell Kennedy))

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Description: "The most intense shoot-out in LAPD history"

After a failed bank robbery, two heavily armed men hold the Los Angeles Police Department at bay for 44 minutes.

Comment: Since I was only about two miles away from the real shootout and saw the footage on the news about 100 times, I was quite interested in seeing the movie to see how accurately it would depict the real event. The film was not only accurate (with very few exceptions) but it was also riveting (with the shootout edited together with documentary-style testimonials from the policemen characters) and peppered with some FX-style swearing and graphic moments. Of the actors, Michael Madsen and Mario Van Peebles were the best (and most well known) and Ron Livingston was good too, but seemed a bit out of place as a hard-edged, SWAT team member. Interesting tidbits were that the gunmen's full names were never mentioned (one was referred to as Larry a few times, but nothing else) and the gunmen characters looked nothing like the real gunmen (the wrong one had long hair and one of the real guys was about 100 pounds heavier than the other). Also, Michael Madsen, who is often confused with Tom Sizemore, who was in the 1995 film Heat, brings up Al Pacino's character from Heat in one of his testimonials. Heat is often mentioned in the same breath as the real North Hollywood incident, because of the similar shootouts and the fact that the real gunmen used the movie as an informal training video for robbing banks. The real gunmen also were nicknamed the 'High Incident Bandits' and the shootout was also the basis for the final episode of the 1996-97 ABC cop show 'High Incident' starring Blair Underwood. Good film.

IMDB TRIVIA FOR 44 MINUTES: THE NORTH HOLLYWOOD SHOOT-OUT (2003) (TV):
- The Bank Of America in the real robbery is in North Hollywood, the one used in the film was a vacant bank in a strip mall in La Habra, California.
- Scenes on the residential streets where the robbers tried escaping from the bank were filmed on the actual locations behind the real bank.
- Some statistics:
- Number of location shooting days: 24
- Number of cameras used: 8
- Number of extras used: 900
- Number of real LAPD Officers used as extras: 35
- Number of rounds of blank ammunition fired: 40,000
- Number of bullet hole squibs used: 5,000
- Number of blood squibs used: 100-150
- Amount of theatrical blood used: 10 gallons
- Number of police cars destroyed: 30
- The photo that Ron Livingston (Donnie Anderson) holds of his "dad" is actually the real life LAPD SWAT officer Donnie Anderson who was one of the 3 SWAT officers who engaged the final suspect and whom Ron Livingstons character is loosely based on. You can also see him and other officers being awarded the LAPD Medal for Valour for their part in the ordeal at the end of the film.

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