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Tower Heist Movie Poster

Tower Heist is a 2011 crime comedy film directed by Brett Ratner and written by Ted Griffin and Jeff Nathanson based on a story by Bill Collage, Adam Cooper, and Griffin. It was released on November 2, 2011 in the United Kingdom, with a United States release following two days later. Tower Heist follows Josh (Ben Stiller), Charlie (Casey Affleck), Dev'reaux (Michael Peña), and Odessa (Gabourey Sidibe), employees of an exclusive apartment building who lose their pensions in the Ponzi scheme of Wall Street businessman Arthur Shaw (Alan Alda). The group enlist the aid of criminal Slide (Eddie Murphy) and bankrupt businessman Mr. Fitzhugh (Matthew Broderick) to break into Shaw's apartment and steal back their money while avoiding the special agent in charge of his case, Claire Denham (Téa Leoni).
Tower Heist began development as early as 2005 based on an idea by Murphy that would star himself and an all-black cast of comedians as a heist group who rob Trump Plaza. As the script developed and changed into an Ocean's Eleven-style caper, Murphy left the project. Ratner continued to develop the idea into what would eventually become Tower Heist, with Murphy later rejoining the production.
Prior to release, the film was involved in a controversy over plans by Universal to release it for home viewing on video on demand to 500,000 Comcast customers, only three weeks after its theatrical debut. Concern over the implementation harming ticket sales and inspiring further films to follow suit resulted in several theater chains refusing to show the film at all if the plan went ahead, forcing Universal to abandon the idea.