Ever since I started going to the movies weekly in 2014, I’ve kept a list of the films that I see (this is entry #296). I occasionally look over the list and I’m always struck by the movies that I have no memory of seeing. These are the film equivalent of taking that last shot at 2am after you told your friends at 8pm that you were taking it easy that night. I call them memory killers and, more often than not, they are action movies. For example, what the hell is Mile 22? Or Hunter Killer? Or Triple 9? Fuck if I know, but I know that I’ve seen them. Honest Thief now joins that illustrious company. Seeing Liam Neeson’s latest action flick is like doing that last jager bomb before you stumble home and fancy yourself an iron chef because you put some string cheese on a slice of Ellio’s before passing out on the couch. You may not clearly remember it later, but you will have a lingering feeling of regret.
Liam Neeson plays the same fucking character that he’s been playing for the last 10 years, this variation being a former marine and retired bank robber. He falls in love and wants to turn himself into the police for a reduced sentence so he can then peacefully live the rest of his life with his new lady friend. Unfortunately, he calls the worst FBI agents in the frigging world and they decide to kill their boss and steal Neeson’s bank heist cash. Unfortunately for them, Neeson has a specific set of skills and blah blah.
This film seems scientifically designed to be forgotten. I don’t even have a problem with it being formulaic. I love old Charles Bronson and Jean Claude Van Damme movies and they are almost all the same. However, those movies tended to be fun or ridiculous or at least sleazy. This is none of those things. The action scenes are few and far between, mostly amounting to lame car chases, and the PG-13 rating is here to ensure that things stay nice and tame. Rarely do I see a movie where the most interesting part happens before the movie begins. Why couldn’t I get Liam Neeson playing a burned-out marine that turns to robbing banks? I would rather watch that fucking movie. But no. I get this boring, bloodless, generic, nearly action-less nonsense about him running from a couple of jackoff agents that he could clearly kill anytime he wants. This is like somebody watched Taken 3 and decided that it would be better if they removed the violence. It isn’t. It really fucking isn’t.
Neeson could play this character in his sleep and he basically does, but the bigger problem is Jai Courtney as the villain. If you don’t recognize his name, Jai Courtney is a black hole of charisma that you might remember from such classics as Terminator: Genesis, Suicide Squad and (shudder) A Good Day to Die Hard. I get so bored watching this man that I’m afraid that I’m going to slip into a coma if I don’t think about something else while he is on screen. His performance isn’t threatening or funny or just remotely interesting, it’s like he Googled “generic villain” and took the top result as his inspiration. There is a scene of Jai Courtney running away from a CGI explosion and I though to myself “this is it, this is the most boring, uninspired moment ever caught on film.” Hollywood, stop trying to make Jai Courtney a thing. Please.
This is one of my shortest reviews because I’ve got nothing. Due to a busy schedule, I also made the mistake of waiting a week before writing this and I’m already only vaguely aware that this movie exists. A year from now it will join the pantheon of films in my list that I could swear don’t actually exist. What the hell is Honest Thief, I’ll wonder to myself before looking up this review to jog my memory. A note to my future self: It isn’t worth remembering. Go back to whatever it is you do in the future.
Image By: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honest_Thief#/media/File:Honest_Thief_poster.jpg
