‘Cash Out’ Review: John Travolta Goes Through the Motions in Uninspired Crypto Caper

variety.com:

Michael Nordine If you’ve been wondering when a heist movie would wed traditional bank-robbing sequences with the current fixation on cryptocurrency, “Cash Out” is here to answer that question. And yet little about this John Travolta vehicle feels new or even timely, as the would-be thriller directed by Ives trades exclusively in shopworn tropes that by now are de rigueur for the genre.

It is, as you might imagine, the story of one last job before our protagonist can finally hang it up for good — which is also how one imagines the role itself might have been pitched to Travolta. The actor, who at this point is like a past-his-prime slugger dragging down his career batting average, brings a familiar name to “Cash Out” but none of the vibrancy we’ve seen from him in the past.

He stars as Mason Goddard, whom we meet as he and his femme-fatale inamorata Amelia Decker (Kristin Davis) arrive at a swanky gathering in their private jet as a pretext for stealing a few million-dollar cars. Though clearly intended to convey a sense of luxury, the low-rent production values make both characters and movie feel ersatz from the outset.

It seems an easy enough gig nevertheless, especially with the support of Mason’s experienced crew, but it all goes pear-shaped once Amelia pulls a gun on him and reveals that her true allegiance has been to the FBI all along. He never saw the double cross coming, presumably because he’s never seen the opening sequence of a caper before.

He and his team elude capture via Plan B, which entails little more than driving into the water in clear view of their pursuers and banking on the cops immediately giving up their search, which, for some reason, they do. Heartbreak compounded by failure leads to