“Charlie Varrick” opens in front of the small town bank Charley, Nadine and their two partners plan to rob. This isn’t their first heist. They know the routine and plan on another uneventful in-and-out job with an unambitious take of no more than a couple thousand dollars – enough to get by for a while and not bring too much heat. In a thrilling sequence, reminiscent of the opening bank robbery in “The Wild Bunch,” things go very wrong very quickly. Gunfire’s exchanged, cops are killed, and so is Nadine. Charley and Harman (“Dirty Harry’s” Scorpio Killer Andy Robinson) escape but once they reach safety find their troubles have just begun.

After making four of his last five films with Clint Eastwood, director Don Siegel made the genius decision to cast Matthau as Varrick, a stooped everyman who, after discovering he’s accidentally stolen $750,000 from the mob, has nothing to rely on other than wily intelligence. The pleasure of this under-rated classic – what Eastwood’s physical competence would’ve drained from it – is wondering how or if a seemingly unexceptional middle-aged crop duster who’s out-gunned, out-manned and stuck with the alcoholic, unstable Harman can outsmart a single-minded, well-heeled mafia enterprise determined to recoup their money and make an example out of whoever stole it.

Matthau’s Charlie Varrick in disguise.

Joe Don Baker is all bearish menace as Molly, the southern-dripped hitman given carte blanche to recover the loot and make the example. He also bears, both physically and in the ruthless-determination department, more than a passing resemblance to Anton Chigurh. The wonderfully oily John Vernon plays the mobbed-up bank president and Sheree North brings her unequaled earthy sexiness to the small but memorable role of a document forger without a loyal bone in her curvaceous body.

“Charley Varrick” is one of Siegel’s best films; one of the best noirs of its kind from this era or any other. The economy of plot, the cast of exceptional character actors (Baker, North, Vernon, Robinson, Norman Fell, William Schallert, Benson Fong, Woodrow Parfey) and a perfect capturing of the small pre-Applebee’d, strip-malled New Mexico towns of the early seventies make for 111 completely immersive minutes.  

The twice Emmy-nominated Sheree North who in the mid-fifties started out as “The Next Marilyn,” but hit her sexual peak in her forties and is probably most famous for playing John Wayne’s lost love in “The Shootist” (1976). 

The real pleasure, however, comes from watching Matthau’s Varrick in over his head but still calmly, methodically and with his life on the line, moving chess pieces as he tries to stay a step ahead of the resourceful and violently unpredictable Molly. As the narrative moves on you slowly come to the unsettling realization that while Varrick may not share Molly’s flair for violence, he is every inch the sociopath as his counterpart. At first, Matthau’s wry demeanor helps you forget his character’s willingness to rob banks, leave his dead wife in a car rigged to explode and kill whoever gets in the way of what he wants

The script, based on “The Looters” by John Reese, is a gem. You can’t afford to miss a thing. Big or small, each plot point eventually pays off in some surprisingly satisfying way, especially when it comes to Varrick’s actions, which are rarely as counter-intuitive as they first appear. There’s also a superb scene, mostly done in a single take, between Vernon and the mousey Parfey, who plays the bank manager. “Pulp Fiction” fans will recognize an iconic bit of dialogue.

After a depressing slate of summer films that numbed us with disappointment, the thoroughly engrossing “Charlie Varrick” is available on DVD and a reminder that smart, simple plots are much harder to pull off than sound, fury, bombast and shaky-cammed excess.