‘Sneakers’

From its first words on the screen right through its closing, this 1992 release is programmed for playfulness. A confident caper movie with a pleasant sense of humor, it goes about its business in such a good-spirited way that it manages to make its familiar “Mission: Impossible” plot seem good as new. The film’s light spirits are due both to the ensemble cast--Sidney Poitier and Robert Redford (from left) plus Dan Aykroyd, Ben Kingsley, Mary McDonnell, David Straithairn and River Phoenix--and to director Phil Alden Robinson. Redford plays the head of a group of San Francisco-based renegades who hire themselves out to companies eager to see if their security systems are really secure (Showtime Monday at 1:45 p.m., Tuesday at 4:45 a.m., Saturday at 8:45 a.m. and 5:45 p.m.).