Tower Heist

There’s not much funny in the Bernie Madoff scandal, except that maybe that a guy named “Madoff” made off with billions of dollars. But the story of a New York financier robbing people blind is the basis for Tower Heist, a comedy that pits a group of working stiffs against a billionaire swindler. Ben Stiller leads the charge for Everyman, playing an apartment-building manager whose pension was willfully mismanaged by a Madoff type played by Alan Alda. Alda’s great; Stiller keeps it moving; and Eddie Murphy is actually not a deterrent, which is a much-rarer occurrence than it needs to be. All in all, Tower Heist is a serviceable flick. The comedy comes from situations, not because it stars comedians—and it sure feels good to pile on the 1 percent.