2008’s Mad Money is an enjoyable but forgettable heist movie wherein three women who work menial jobs at the Federal Reserve in Kansas City steal great sums of bills about to be shredded.

The operation is masterminded by Diane Keaton, who used to be living the upper-crust life until her husband (played by Ted Danson) got shitcanned from his executive job.  Reduced to cleaning toilets at the reserve, she finds a flaw in the supposedly unbreakable security, enlists two other low-wage employees there (Queen Latifa and Katie Holmes) and soon they are walking away with large quantities of money.

This is a movie I couldn’t find any particular flaws in, yet it feels very insubstantial.  I barely remember it and I just watched it. 

That’s a shame because there are some clever lines.  One problem may be those lines ring false.  For example, Danson explaining how his wife ending up in a life of crime, “We’re a consumerist society.  She got consumed.”  No real person says something like that off the top of their head—that’s how a comedy writer who needs to be reined-in writes.

Queen Latifah has the best lines, and the best delivery of those lines.  One of her sons explains a document from school with, “It’s a list of weapons we’re no longer allowed to bring”, and she shoots back with crack comic timing, “There’s weapons you are allowed to bring?”.

Another line that really resonated with me is when Keaton is newly hired and receiving a tour of the facility.  As her guide explains, the place is like Vegas: all cameras, no clock or windows and tons of money everywhere.  Only difference is nobody here is having any fun.

As for the structure of this film, it starts in the present day and then tells the bulk of the story in flashback.  I am so tired so this overused conceit.  The problem with starting at the end and doing the rest in flashback is we know characters will get out of any tense situation that occurred in the past.  While there is still the matter of how they will get out of those predicaments, the stakes aren’t as high if you know those people made it out OK.  Otherwise, they wouldn’t be there in the future we have already seen.

Mad Money is passable entertainment—I would say solidly good but not even very good.  It is a pleasant enough diversion if you’re looking for one, but there are so many movies that do everything this one does but better.

Dir: Callie Khouri

Starring Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah, Katie Holmes, Ted Danson

Watched on Kanopy