Honest Thief Review: Liam Neeson is Back And Trying to Come Clean

Release date: October 16, 2020
Running time: 99 minutes
Starring:  Liam Neeson, Kate Walsh, Jeffrey Donovan, Jai Courtney, and Anthony Ramos 
Written and Directed By: Mark Wiliams

They call him the In and Out Bandit because meticulous thief Tom Carter (Liam Neeson) has stolen $9 million from small-town banks while managing to keep his identity a secret. But after he falls in love with the bubbly Annie (Kate Walsh), Tom decides to make a fresh start by coming clean about his criminal past, only to be double-crossed by two ruthless FBI agents.  

This film has an interesting premise with a thief trying to come clean.  I like the idea of someone who was so good and meticulous at their craft that they never got caught, but rather decided to come clean because their conscious was weighing on them.  And the characters were at least fun to see, even if they were mostly one dimensional.  Neeson has some layers, and Walsh does a good job as his girlfriend.  But the police involved all followed a normal path and were basically good, evil, or confused.  

And the film is classic Liam Neeson, someone who is mild mannered but also has some sort of special background training that is forced to use that in a bad situation. If you liked him in any of those other films (the Taken Series, the Grey, Cold Pursuit, the Commuter, etc.) then you will know generally how this film is.  It's not a knock so much, just that Neeson has a type of film that he does and this very much fits into that mold.  And this film is a little different than previous ones because Neeson is sort of the bad guy (though he plays a nice, mild mannered thief) and he is fighting corrupt cops who can get away with more due to their authority.

However, this film is typical Neeson.  I felt like I had seen this movie before, just with a different dressing.  And unlike in his previous film, this film did not have as much action.  It was more about intrigue, plotting, and running rather than all out action.  There are some good scenes, but a lot of the conflict is tense standoffs or cat and mouse type games.  The film also has too many convenient mistakes by the cops and character changes that seem to happen too quickly, but that is all in service of the story.  And the story itself tries to justify Neeson's thievery, but it also feels like too convenient of an excuse.  

The Honest Thief is classic Liam Neeson, with an interesting premise and plenty of tense, cat and mouse scenes.   

Rent it.

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Honest Thief is available in theaters on October 16, 2020.