Ca$h (2010)

Wonderful character development!

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

This film tells the story of a married couple who lands themselves almost seven hundred thousand dollars that literally falls out from the sky. However, it's rightful owner tracks them down and demands every cent of the money they have taken and spent. "Cash" may sound like an interesting idea, that a couple undergoes changes that they could never imagine. Chris Hemsworth and his on screen wife form a sweet couple who are honest and innocent. The guy who wants the money back, however, counts every cent even though he has recovered most of the money. It gets super tedious and even ridiculous that the characters in the film keep counting cents every minute. Why keep counting the cents when you can count in hundreds of thousands? It makes the film so annoying, and it's more like an accountant's wet dream.

Ca$h has an obnoxiously tongue in cheek title, and a premise that could have easily run off the rails into the silly zone. But rejoice: It knows how to create a tense, unpredictable environment accented by the slightest bits of naturally occurring humour here and there, a winning combination indeed. Sean Bean doesn't often get a movie to himself, or at least get to play the lead. Here's he's the top dog, and while most would argue that he's the antagonist as well, I'm in the opposite corner on that one. Yes he's a criminal, yes he goes to extreme lengths to get his money back, but he's a rigidly disciplined and staunchly fair bloke, driven by a set of principles and operational tics that reek of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and trust me, it takes one to know one. Oh, and he gets to play identical twins as well, pulling a Parent Trap and acting opposite himself which is a delight to see. When reckless career criminal Reese Kubrick (Bean) dicks up a robbery, loses a bunch of money and gets apprehended, a young couple think they have hit the jackpot. Played by Chris Hemsworth and Victoria Profeta, they find the money and make that fateful cinematic mistake of trying to keep it for themselves. Before they know it, Reese's brother Pyke (also Bean) comes looking for them, and believe me when I say that this guy is a dude who finds what he's looking for. Fast. The young couple has already begun to indulge, and as Pyke barges into their lives he finds a great deal of the amount spent. He then buckles down and calmly, coolly forces them to come up with every remaining cent of the 'deficit', as he calls it, even if it means doing a bit of illegal stuff themselves. Bean has a ball as the icy cool, ruthlessly efficient prick who plays hardball with a glint in his eye. He's karma manifest, a very real and very dangerous metaphor for the perilous risk of excessive currency and ill gotten gains. It's a terrific role for him, both in the moments of dangerous serenity and the few rare instances where he loses his cool streak, which sting like daggers. Hemsworth and Profeta play their standard roles very nicely. An arbitrary bit of fun: the actor Glenn Plummer shows up for a hysterical cameo as a dude named, I kid you not, Glenn The Plumber, who receives a whollop of a verbal beatdown from Bean that serves as the film's most lighthearted moment, and is a riot for anyone who gets the reference. Snuck into limited DVD release back in 2010, this one deserves more than the small shelf space it's gotten. Fun stuff.

Not a great movie, poor script and weak acting from all the main protagonists. The plot line is, as an earlier review, alluded to, very simplistic although although not as much as many other crime movies. I had the misfortune to see Bruce Willis in 'cop out' the other day which made this seem unbelievably complex in comparison. The earlier reviewer got a few things wrong. The scene where Sam And his wife leave for the day is, badly done granted, a flashback to before he comes across the cash. Sam endures a sleepless night worrying about money and the impending bank manager. Presumably he was on his way to the bank when the case fell on to his car and this is why he was 5 minutes late. In short, the first opportunity he gets, back home with his wife, he does count the cash. Secondly, the greeting to the manager of "my banker" wasn't for the viewers benefit but was a sarcastic salutation to show how Sam no longer regarded his position as subservient to the bank manager, heavy handed but really quite obvious. Thirdly, the scene with the black guy wasn't great but Sean Bean's accent wasn't Irish, nor was it anywhere else in the film, but broad Sheffield in Yorkshire where Sean Bean is from. I did find the start a bit puzzling as we saw a short haul BA 737 landing at a UK airport only to find Sean Bean walking out into a US car lot. Simple stuff like this should have died with the 70's.

"Cash" has an irresistible premise: What if you came across a huge amount of money? If you decide to keep it, what would happen if the owner came looking for it? The first seventy-five minutes of the movie are pretty captivating. The beginning of the movie playfully jumps back and forth in time, giving us the setup piece by piece until we know fully who is who and what's going on. But as the movie goes on, the whole movie is stolen by Sean Bean. He is absolutely GREAT as the "fixer" brought in to solve the problem. He's not only a scary character, but he has a whole bunch of little touches (like pausing to drink from a kitchen faucet before starting a beatdown) that keep us interested in him and stop him from becoming one-note.Mostly because of Bean, I am recommending the movie. However, I have to admit that the movie has some serious flaws that prevent it from being a GREAT movie. We learn next to nothing about the protagonists before they get the money. When Bean enters their lives and starts terrifying them, they come across as more perplexed than scared. And although they own their own home, for some reason they don't get a mortgage that would more than pay for their remaining debt to Bean. The last half hour of the movie gets somewhat absurd when Bean forces the couple to rob convenience stores to pay the balance of their debt. Still, there's enough good stuff here to make the movie worth renting at your local video once it moves off the new release shelf to the catalog section.