That’s great material for a movie in which director Daniel Alfredson and writers William Brookfield and Peter R. de Vries spurn the rules of the genre and deliver a refreshing narrative that purists may not like. Co-writer de Vries shunned the film’s premiere because he disagreed with the ending and felt the film did not accurately describe the actual events. Methinks he nitpicked three decades after the event.

The bank tells four owners of a failing Dutch construction firm that a loan isn’t possible. So who else has a lot of dosh? What about Alfred Heineken whose brew they enjoy? From that seed grows a plan that may not exactly replicate the events but does tell an agreeably engrossing story in which the heroes are the villains relying on the success of their machinations to rescue their firm from financial trouble and provide for their families.

What Willem (Sam Worthington) and Cor (Jim Sturgess), prime movers of the caper, couldn’t have foreseen was Heineken’s tough survival resolve. Zillionaire businessmen don’t get that way without knowing how to win arguments. Anthony Hopkins plays him with convincing ease, not an easy task when chained to a brick wall in a purpose-built dungeon.

One of the film’s niggles is its conversion of many graffiti on its exterior locations to English which most Dutch also speak. Offsetting that is a gratifying departure from convention. The film doesn’t show how the police cracked the case. Which they certainly did.

At Capitol 6 and Hoyts Belconnen.