Mark Wahlberg, Charlize Theron, and Jason Statham in 'The Italian Job'

The high-revving Job employs Mark "Boogie Nights" Wahlberg as unlikely, but hunky mastermind thief Charlie Crocker. Always-alluring Charlize Theron shines as Stella Bridger, daughter of soon-to-be-deceased career safecracker John Bridger (Donald Sutherland). And Ed "Fight Club" Norton begrudgingly appears as inside-man Steve Frezelli, a cranky crook with no idea what to do with his share of the loot, but very specific ideas about what to do with everyone else's.

Norton has made it known that he only took the role in The Italian Job for contractual reasons. Never mind the feisty but fallow flick's implausible plot and angel-hair thin character development, Ed's most likely nagging because he doesn't get to play any "Reindeer Games" with Charlize Theron, South Africa's most glittering export, behind whom all the diamonds and gold in Johannesburg come in a distant second and third.

And even Charlize has to turn down her high beams and take an occasional back seat to The Italian Job's real meatballs and potatoes, two spectacular chase sequences that bookend the movie's breakneck and blessedly brief 104 minutes.

The gold heist in Venice at film's opening leads to the most lifejacket-gripping, gondola-tipping speedboat chase since Geoffrey Reeve's 1970 thriller, Puppet on a Chain. Still, all that's just murky water under the bridge compared to The Italian Job's gear-grinding climax as Charlie, Stella and company attempt to stop Frezelli from moving "their" gold to Mexico from his heavily guarded bad-boy bachelor pad in the Hollywood Hills. So, by mini-car, armored car, subway car, motorcycle, helicopter and everything but turbo rollerblades, The Italian Job bum rushes its way through to its pleasant if predictable wrap up.

Along for the white-knuckle ride are Jason Statham as Handsome Rob, an English getaway driver who's even smoother with the ladies than he is behind the wheel and Seth Green (Dr. Evil's son Scott from Austin Powers) as computer-geek genius Lyle, who insists on being called "The Napster" – a running joke referring to Lyle's claim that he was the unrecognized genius behind the infamous music-sharing software. As running gags go, this one needs an immediate retread. Nevertheless, from Napster to Rap-ster, The Job's crew lastly includes Mos Def as explosives expert Left Ear, named for a bathroom fireworks mishap that left him, well, mostly deaf.

The movie's motley multi-ethnic crew strongly resembles the melting pot of a mob in last year's George Clooney-lead caper remake, Ocean's 11. Fortunately, Julia Roberts is no where in sight this time and the lack of a tacked-on love interest in The Italian Job keeps the action firmly focused on the winding road ahead. Still, it wouldn't have killed Job director F. Gary Gray to find at least one logical reason for Theron's Stella to audition at a mob-run LA strip club.

The Italian Job doesn't take on any tasks the original didn't. But in keeping with the tagline, its likeable crew still gets the audience into the sensational if superficial story, and most surprisingly lets Wahlberg get even with naysayers who predicted he'd never work again after The Truth About Charlie.