Welcome to Collinwood is a comedy about a bunch of would-be burglars who get in way over their heads, to the point where they don't even realize how deep in trouble they are. Only thing is, these guys are so thick, their potential for a big score so dubious, that they're in over their heads from the moment they begin planning. The question is never whether they're going to fail, but how and to what extent.

By remaking an Italian caper comedy, 1958's Big Deal on Madonna Street, writer-directors Anthony and Joe Russo hedge their bets on this, their feature-film debut: The setup is filled with comic potential, the plot is sure-fire and the source material is time-tested for resiliency (botched crimes have been a cinematic staple forever). But they also leave themselves open to charges of slavishly adhering to the earlier film.

Collinwood, a neighborhood of Cleveland that seems to have not advanced an inch since the Depression, is populated by dreamers. All the small-time hoods are searching for their own Bellini, a score that guarantees they'll spend the rest of their lives on Easy Street.

The Bellini here is a safe containing $300,000, sitting inside a room where the walls have purposely been left only half-finished, the easier for a couple of hoods to break through from an adjacent apartment. The would-be crooks consist of five dim, desperate bulbs: Riley (William H. Macy), an impoverished artist - he paints women on drinking glasses - who needs the money to feed his baby and bail his wife out of jail; flashy Leon (Isaiah Washington), who needs the cash to pay for his sister's wedding reception; Basil (Andrew Davoli), who's both cash-poor and emotionally starved - it's tough to figure what he needs more, a bank account or a girlfriend; Toto (Michael Jeter), an aging, small-time thief who's never made it beyond rung one of any ladder; and Pero (Sam Rockwell), an aspiring boxer and ladies' man who doesn't have a clue how to be good at either.

Somehow, these guys have to work together well enough to get the job done. Anyone want to lay odds?

All hit just the notes their characters require. And George Clooney adds wonderfully to the mix as Jerzy, a wheelchair-bound safecracker who, for $500, will explain all there is to cracking a safe. None of the gang bats an eye when Jerzy's "expertise" involves showing them how to use a hand drill.

The brothers Russo keep the anarchy level just high enough that there's never any doubt where all this is headed but never let things get totally out of hand. Yeah, these guys are thick and, if possible, getting thicker, but they're not cartoon characters. Yet, from the opening shot, with four of them standing on a street corner and looking as though they'd just escaped from an explosion (the rest of the film is told mostly in flashback),Welcome to Collinwood is clearly a spiritual descendant of the old Looney Toons cartoons; it's not hard to imagine Daffy, Bugs, Porky and their pals in the starring roles here.

And that's a cinematic pedigree worth cherishing.

Collinwood

Starring William H. Macy, Sam Rockwell

Written, directed by Anthony and Joe Russo

Released by Warner Bros.

Rated R (language)

Time 86 minutes

Sun Score * * *