Caine lives up to the ""Flawless" title, anyway

A sort of highbrow British version of "Mad Money," Michael Radford's "Flawless" is the tale of a heist that sounds much too easy. Laura Quinn (Demi Moore, at her archest) is an executive at the London Diamond Corp. in 1960; Hobbs (Michael Caine) is the nighttime janitor there. She is highly visible as a rare female manager perpetually watching her male cohorts get promoted ahead of her; he is someone nobody notices. So, why shouldn't this improbable pair snatch a few diamonds for themselves? It's a chance for Laura to get revenge, and as for Hobbs, well, "I hate English winters," he says smoothly.

Edward Anderson's screenplay finds an ingenious twist for the heist (though the film's ending feels contrived), and costume designer Dinah Collin has created a chic shades-of-gray wardrobe for Moore — who's constantly adjusting her precisely fitted business clothes, as if she's not quite comfortable in them. Laura Quinn is an American who's acquired a British veneer; she speaks with clipped, diamond-sharp precision, and she smokes as if she'd scream if she didn't. (In a perfect detail, her elegant flat sports a tall ashtray next to the bathtub.) Moore doesn't quite find the soul of this very controlled woman, but perhaps it isn't there to find.

Happily, Hobbs is the sort of role that Caine could play in his sleep — and, even more happily, he doesn't. With a soft Cockney accent and an unruffled manner, he takes over the movie and calms it. Watching him, still in top form in his mid-70s, is a delight; his charm is as easy and larky as a springtime stroll, his burnished voice familiar and yet unexpected. Describing how he'll carry the diamonds out not on his person but in his Thermos, Hobbs dryly explains, "I could take off all my clothes and walk away naked. A frightening thought, Miss Quinn. Don't dwell on it."

"Flawless" certainly isn't flawless (come on, you knew that was coming): Its deliberate pacing too often feels slow, and it keeps conjuring memories of better heist movies. But those of us who'll happily watch Caine in pretty much anything will find enough pleasures here. "Fortune favors the bold," Hobbs cheerfully tells Laura; the man who nobody notices, it turns out, notices all.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com