"This ain't no bank robbery!" says Denzel Washington in Spike Lee's newest crime caper, Inside Man.

Since 2004's She Hate Me, Lee has been under the radar with smaller projects, but in his newest flick, Lee shows that he hasn't lost his touch.

Exploring a new genre, Lee takes the ordinary heist film and brings it to the next level, leading the audience on a wild goose chase, where the line between good guy and bad guy blurs.

Packed with heavy hitters like Clive Owen (Closer), Jodie Foster (Flightplan), Willem Dafoe (Spiderman) and of course Washington, the performances never disappoint.

Washington plays detective Keith Frazier, an off-the-cuff cop whose street smarts serve him well as hostage negotiator. After toiling away on the job, Frazier is looking to make first-grade detective any way he can.

Playing opposite Washington is Owen as the alleged masked robber, Dalton Russell, who plots the "perfect bank robbery" and leads an organized team of thieves. Smart and cunning, Owen keeps the cops on their feet with his elaborate schemes that rival Ocean's Eleven.

The hostages themselves add another layer to the film as great character sketches of New York's melting pot population and illustrate Lee's style of playing off stereotypes. With a rabbi, a sheik and a loud mouth from Long Island, the hostages become quite a handful.

Though it's not his typical fare, Lee's touch is very subtle and only very apparent in a number of grimy interrogation scenes that serve as flashbacks peppered throughout the movie and provide comic relief.

Despite the seriousness of the situation, there are many tension-breaking moments that poke fun at pop culture. In a scene between Owen and the son of a hostage, he's appalled by the boy's violent video game depicting street violence. The son soberly replies, "Like my man 50 says, 'Get rich or die tryin.' "

Throughout the movie, Owen's character and his motives are ever so slowly revealed and leaves the viewer wondering who to root for.

Thrown into this highly charged testosterone arena is Foster who plays Madeline White, a heartless private negotiator who's sent in to protect certain "interests" by a wealthy businessman. Her presence brings more complications to an ugly situation, a nice change for Foster, who ditches her usual role of heroine for villainess.

While the plot twists and turns, the action is always there, and Lee makes sure his audience never gets lost. Despite a trend in Hollywood these days to abandon chronology, the script is extremely well written and manages never to go off track.

Action flicks love to throw meaningful dialogue to the wind, but with Inside Man, the banter is half the fun -- with the exception of the line first mentioned.

Washington and Lee's relationship was clearly influential to the success of this film. Having worked together on a number of films, Lee never reins him in and knows how to utilize his leading man. Spielberg has Hanks, Burton has Depp and Lee has Washington.

Heist films will always be in high demand with each one trying to out-do the next. Inside Man continues this tradition without getting tripped up in plot devices and far-fetched schemes.

It expands the genre in a new direction and marks a triumphant return for Spike Lee.

Grade: B+