A genius engineering graduate has been recruited to breach the walls of the Bank of Spain, to capture precious, lost treasure, concealed inside a secure vault. He, along with the assembled team, devise a plan to break into the bank and take the vault, while the staff are seemingly distracted by a football match being played and broadcast on the big screen in the town center. A really well-made film that successfully keeps you intrigued from the first minute to the last, which has just been released on Amazon Prime Video.

Director: Jaume Balaguero
Writers: Rafa Martinez, Andres M Koppel, Borja Glez Santaolalla
Starring: Freddie Highmore, Liam Cunningham, Sam Riley, Astrid Berges-Frisbey

On a personal level, it’s been a pretty slow month or two when it’s come to catching any new releases that have hit our screens, but with that being said, The Vault, a flick recently added to Amazon Prime Video, seemed to be one that stood out among the rest. Shot and filmed entirely in Spain, the film even managed to incorporate the 2010 Football World Cup into the story, which seemed to add a rather unique spin on things. You’d also be forgiven for thinking this entire plot was based on a true story, but that wasn’t to be the case.

For sure, the actual story wasn’t exactly a unique one and I certainly felt like there were some issues when it came to the believability, but like most heist movies, if they are made well, then they can come across as entertaining – something which this one was. The movie managed to contain a good amount of intrigue and suspense too, more than enough to keep your interest throughout the almost two-hour runtime.

A minor flaw that I’d like to point out, which has become somewhat of a pet peeve for me, would have to be the terrible sound mixing that was on display. The mixing itself seemed to make a large portion of the dialogue difficult to comprehend, especially as the overly dramatic soundtrack was extremely loud and overbearing on more than one occasion. If you’re able to bypass that, however, then you shouldn’t have much of a problem.

In terms of the cast, Freddie Highmore adopted the role of Thom, the at times, awkward engineering genius that spearheaded the majority of the picture. Meanwhile, Liam Cunningham, Sam Riley and Astrid Berges-Frisbey portrayed Walter, James and Lorraine, all commanding their fair share of screentime too. Elsewhere and most notably, Famke Janssen also starred, picking up the role of Margaret, but unfortunately only warranting a small amount of screentime, compared to her time in the flick, Asher (2018).

All in all, The Vault probably won’t go down as the most appealing film of 2021, especially considering some of the believability and originality issues, but at the same time it didn’t strike me as the worst way to spend two hours of an evening either. It’s worth noting that The Vault is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

“I want you to help me break into the vault of the most secure location in the world…”

Walter – The Vault