Honest Thief is an action thriller starring Liam Neeson and Robert Patrick. It is directed by Mark Williams.
It is not difficult to picture Liam Neeson in a part of the likeable good guy who, forced by extraordinary circumstances, has to recur to more drastic – or violently bang-bangish, rather – means. Well, this movie is no exception to that mental association. The title ‘Honest Thief’ is, in and by itself, a give away of what to expect.
An action thriller movie that is, well, not excessive in the action aspect, and has a charismatic yet somewhat predictable lead character.
Plot of Honest Thief
Tom Dolan, known as the “In-and-Out Bandit”, is a big-time bank robber, who, having fallen in love with Annie Wilkins, decides to mend his professional ways in order to embark on a new life with his beloved putting his criminal past behind. With that in mind, he strikes a deal with the FBI. In exchange for turning himself and his loot in he will be granted a shorter sentence.
The deal goes awry when the two FBI agents double-cross him, and Tom now find himself embroiled in a violent st strife.
Movie Review
This film brings us nothing new under the sun. The first time you see the formula: ok, it wasn’t new but it works, it’s entertaining, and so on, but this good actor has been making the same movie a few times and already… the plot becomes tiresome. This time he is, if possible, even better and the movie has hardly any action until the end when it gets a little wild, but not much.
Evidently, Liam Neeson knows how to act and put on a little “good face” (as not to have learned) and that of transmitting goodness with his features seems to give him well. Then we associate him with these more or less entertaining and repetitive films and we have the movie: easy to make and uncomplicated, without delving too much into the characters and their stories, and without the need for an elaborate production that Hollywood can’t handle.
Without being a bad movie if you see it like a unique monad (yes, from Greek monas “unit”), it loses much or most of its weight due to the accumulation of other similar movies, trilogies, and so on.
No kidding, clearly targeted at a middle-aged audience that takes care of families (nothing against them, we are talking about the movie, not the tastes of each one) and without a single surprise at a technical or artistic level.
It is a movie navigates within the bounds of the genre’s formulaic comfort zone.
When Liam Neeson appears with a gun on the cover, we already know what to expect.
Our Opinion
We were not convinced when we saw the trailer, and we are not convinced after having watched the movie either. In an interview the actor said that he was too old to continue making action movies…well, I don’t know, here we have another one.
Clearly, both the formula and the character are suffering from some wear and tear.
Oh well, that happens even to Christmas.
The Cast
Liam Neeson
Liam Neeson is an actor known for the movies Schindler’s List (1993), Rob Roy and Star Wars: Episode I and The Dark Night Rises.
William John Neeson was born on June 7, 1952 in Ballymena, Antrim, Ireland, United Kingdom.
Starred in Honest Thiesf (2020).
Nowadays, we have watched him in the thriller movie Memory (2022), alongside Guy Pearce.
Liam Neeson is an actor from Northern Ireland.[1] He has received several accolades throughout his career, including nominations for an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, two Tony Awards, and three Golden Globe Awards. In 2020, he was placed 7th on The Irish Times list of Ireland’s 50 Greatest Film Actors. (From Wikipedia)
Movie Trailer
