Honest Thief is an motion movie within the spirit of Taken, however with the identical actor, and an analogous script. When a thief decides to provide again all the cash that he stole with a view to make reparations and rejoin society to be with the girl he loves, a few crooked FBI brokers determine to steal the cash as a substitute, and body him for homicide. However, they don’t anticipate him to have a particular set of expertise that he’ll use to actual vengeance on them.

Tom (Liam Neeson) is a financial institution robber, often known as “the in-and-out bandit,” and for his capacity to rob banks and steal copious quantities of money with out hurting anybody, or getting caught. When he falls for sweet-hearted receptionist Annie (Kate Walsh) at a public storage facility, he decides that he needs to show himself in for his crimes, providing to return all the cash he has stolen in alternate for a decreased sentence so he can stay the remainder of his life with Annie, guilt-free. One main hurdle for his or her relationship is that Annie doesn’t know precisely what Tom’s previous is like.

Two FBI brokers present as much as accumulate the money and assist facilitate the simple arrest of Tom. But Agent Nivens (Jai Courtney) and Agent Hall (Anthony Ramos) see a chance, and make the last-minute resolution to steal the cash for themselves, framing Tom for the homicide of one other FBI agent who exhibits as much as the scene. With Tom on the run, he’s bought to do no matter it takes to make every thing proper, attempting to deliver justice to the crooked FBI brokers whereas on the similar time, attempting to clear his identify and preserve Annie out of it.

Directed and co-written by Mark Williams (Ozark, A Family Man) there’s not a lot that any of the people can do to liven up the flat characters. The thief of the title position is already trustworthy to a fault, so Tom can’t actually do a lot to redeem himself. In providing to provide the cash again, it opens the door for every kind of recent violence and mayhem to happen, involving Tom, Annie, and a number of fine and unhealthy FBI brokers. There is a transparent selection to not discover the feelings or guilt round creating this quantity of unrest on this planet, and Williams doesn’t push his forged to take care of any discomfort, aside from bodily.

While there are parts of Honest Thief which can be certainly trustworthy, such because the candy romance between Tom and Annie, or the necessity to do the appropriate factor regardless of the results, there’s an excessive amount of that performs out antithetically: the great guys are genuinely unhealthy individuals, and the unhealthy man is a extremely, genuinely good one who didn’t actually even need the $9 million {dollars} that he spent a decade of his life stealing from 12 totally different banks. Even the educated, almost-college graduate receptionist that he falls for can’t consider something cleverer to say about Tom’s previous than, “knowing how to blow stuff up, that’s pretty cool.”

After watching many explosions with none emotional funding within the characters, blowing stuff up is just not that cool in spite of everything. But the payoff of your complete final third of the movie being one lengthy drawn out automotive chase, explosion, shootout, fistfight is perhaps the entire level of the movie. Sadly, the most important plot gap is that if Tom actually didn’t care about all that cash that he stole, and it was simply out of ideas instilled in him by his circle of relatives, then he’s sacrificing not cash however his personal ideas for a shot at creating an trustworthy household together with his new relationship. That rings patently dishonest.

The macaroni and cheese of motion films, Honest Thief is filling consolation meals that predictably serves up a dose of Liam Neeson confidently exacting revenge on some baddies. Explosives, homicide, and mayhem are barely curbed by the PG-13 ranking.