I've decided to write a story about a bank robbery because I thought of an interesting way for them to escape but I don't know how to write a good scene for the robbery without if being the cliché "Guys in mask run in and *bang *bang steal all the money" or nor do I want to go the way of them digging in the bank... I'm trying to come up with a clever unique way of them getting the money. Any help?.. Please
What if the robbers acquired fake police uniforms/badges, and everyone thought they were just there to guard against bank robberies, but then suddenly they locked all the exits and took over? Besides, it's all in the way that you write it that determines how good a scene will be. Avoid cliche phrases and descriptions.
Try watching this film called Nokas - it's a film based on witnesses' accounts of a bank robbery which I think was in Sweden (though not 100% sure). It was very original - they actually made the attack scene funny. Everyone was frantic as they saw guys with masks and sledge hammers appear outside the wall of glass - the scene took a slow motion, showing you how the guy tried to smash the window with his hammer - only it didn't smash. All in slow motion, the guy does it again and again, but the bullet-proof glass still didn't smash. And 1 woman inside tried to push into the lift to escape, which meant pushing the woman already in it plus their carriage of cash inside, leaving basically no room for the doors to close. They had to get out and go back in. Then back to the robbers, the leader shouted, "Get the f-ing window down, our hostages are running away with all our money!" I thought it was really funny And rather realistic too - it shows basically all the very human errors anyone would make, even the bank robbers after all their planning! Try reading Swedish crime novels - the Swedes have a way of presenting things in a very down-to-earth way that shows their characters as very, very human. I find their style very appealing in this sense - I have so far only found this in Swedish writing (classics excluded).
No, it was in Norway. They planned the robbery for a long time, but miscalculated the strength of a window. Although they managed to smash it, they took longer than expected and ended up in a shootout with the police, leaving one policeman dead. While they got caught eventually, it was the biggest robbery in the history of Norway, and to this day not all the money has been recovered.
I love movies where they're not going in to steal the more obvious goal of cold, hard, cash, but they take something from a safe deposit box or something like that. Then I love it when the story develops from that point as we find out who is the owner of the safe deposit box and what actually was inside. Or you could do a story like the robbery in the movie The Dark Knight, where the entire story is set within the bank as the robbers subdue the people in the bank, fend off the "heroes" and then end up eliminating each other one by one until the robbers become the hunted. Then you could find out there was one particular villain or puppetmaster behind the whole thing... Cool.
Inside jobs are always ammusing, have the bad guys be the armared car drivers... That will sting in the end lol.
I love the bank robbery scene in Two Hands. One of the robbers jumps the counter and grabs the cash, but catches his foot on the counter jumping back out and face plants, knocking himself out. The other robbers have to try and drag him out as well as the cash
Coming up with a unique, clever take on it is good. At the same time, there's probably a reason the simple mask, gun, and note or demand for money has been around for so long
I think the easiest way to set a bank robbery scene apart from the others would be with dialogue. Give the main character committing the crime a big personality and a lot to say. It would also go a long way to endear the reader to a character who opens the story doing something we find inherently repulsive, stealing.
Or have another character do the robbery and rob the robber (could the MC bluff the robber with something as simple as a plastic spoon before he even leaves the bank? I'm sure it could be written!)