Anthony Ramos also does great as the corrupt FBI agent with a conscience. While Courtney is fun as Boomerang in Suicide Squad and its upcoming sequel, he needs to play down and out villains, as he actually was convincing in Honest Thief. For the longest time, I’ve screamed aloud, “why is Hollywood trying to make Jai Courtney a thing?” This is probably his best performance since appearing on Starz’ first season of Spartacus as he plays a corrupt FBI agent who is sinking himself deeper and deeper in a hole of his own hubris. ![]() ![]() While this is a Liam Neeson show, the supporting characters do a great job. The plot isn’t overly complex, but Honest Thief also doesn’t have any fat on it, and once the action starts, it rarely lets up. Neeson also seems to be having fun underneath his scowl in this film as well and isn’t phoning it in as well. His menace, quick fights, and fun car chases work better for the start at this stage in his career. Director Mark Williams knows that Neeson is no longer a spring chicken and filming extensive cut together footage no longer looks exciting, but instead knows how to play to Neeson’s strengths. Honest Thief is a fun return to form for old-school Neeson action. But that doesn’t mean that Honest Thief is down there with some of the latter Old Man Action duds that Neeson has done. Now is this as good as Taken? Unfortunately, not. There’s plenty of car chases, shootouts, and fun fisticuffs to last the sleek 90 minutes for this action-adventure. Myers ready for justice against Tom, who the corrupt agents framed, but soon starts to realize there is more to this story than what’s on the surface. So begins a tight cat and mouse game as the agents try to not only find Tom (and steal the remaining money from him) who is now royally pissed at them and doing his best rendition of Bryan Mills once again, but they also have Agent Baker’s partner Agent Myers in the mix as well. At first, the Jr agents also don’t believe he the famous robber, but when they see the cash in hand, they start having grander, more corrupt ideas for themselves and decide to rob Tom of his cash, but their plan quickly gets out of hand as they are forced to kill agent Baker and frame Tom. As a result, they pass the case along to agents John Nivens (Jai Courtney) and Ramon Hall (Anthony Ramos) to meet with him and investigate if he’s the real McCoy. After all, there have been dozens of people “confessing” to be the In-and-Out Bandit. At first FBI agents, Sam Baker (Robert Patrick) and Tom Meyers (Jeffrey Donovan) don’t believe he is in fact who he says he is. Not wanting to continue to lie to the woman he loves, Tom decides the best thing to do is to confess to the FBI that he is the In-and-Out Bandit, turn in the money, and negotiate a reduced prison sentence for a minimum-security prison with visitation rights. As the two become interested in each other and start falling in love, Tom realizes that he no longer needs this life of crime (he doesn’t even spend the money he steals, it’s more for the rush of it) and wants to settle with Annie. His life takes a turn when he goes to a storage facility to stash his cash and meets the manager of the storage place Annie (Kate Walsh). He never hurts anyone through his robberies, and usually does it when the banks closed on the weekend (just go with it). ![]() Tom Carter (Neeson) is the “In-and-Out Bandit,” a thief who robs small banks with meticulous planning and execution for a decade and has amassed himself a small fortune in the amount of 9 million dollars. However, Honest Thief is a reminder of Neeson in his badass glory as he is back in rare form. ![]() Lately, the formula has gotten a little stale as there are only so many quick edits one can take in a film. While not every movie he’s in can be as good as the movie that put him on top, he usually entertains as he’s kicking ass. Since then he’s fought pretty much everybody: terrorists, wolves, gods, hell, Even Batman. Since starring in 2008’s Taken, Liam Neeson pretty much reinvented the action genre by starring in what comedian W Kamau Bell has coined “Old Man Action” films.
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