HONEST THIEF
A movie even more dull than its title, Honest Thief finds Liam Neeson as Tom, a bank robber extraordinaire who’s fallen in love (with Kate Walsh) and decided to come clean to the Feds. He’ll give them all the robbery loot in exchange for a light sentence. Tom calls the FBI 800 number, two low-level agents (Jai Courtney and Anthony Ramos) appear, steal the money, and in the process, end up killing their FBI boss (Robert Patrick). They pin the muder on Neeson, who goes on the run only to later vow revenge after the two rough up his girlfriend. Don’t mess with Liam’s loved ones, right?
It takes writer-director Mark Williams (A Family Man) and co-writer Steve Allrich (The Canyon) half of forever to set all this up, after which there are poorly staged car chases and an exploding house, but zero forward motion, much less tension. The script, which must have been short, cannot have read well.
So maybe Neeson really is here for the cash, and all of it apparently because there was clearly no budget for extras, much less an army of FBI agents to give chase to the agent killer. There are six featured characters in Honest Thief, but no one else, not even passerbys in danger of being hit by speeding cars. In what might be a first, there are more credited executive producers than actors on screen. This movie would be a bust even as a direct-to-video rental. My dad, a Neeson man from way back, is going to be so bummed. (Chuck Wilson)