Then the three thieves can hide in a bathroom stall and talk really loudly about what they've just down while shoving stacks of bills into their underwear. If they happen to talk about your plan in public, where the local waiter overhears it, or over cell phones while they know the police are surveilling their every move, all the better.

After the fact, of course, each is sure to spend the money on buying her house back, putting her kids in an elite prep school, and buying her suddenly-appeared husband a motorcycle. How these three aren't caught before their plan is even past the initial planning stage is fishy, and the fact that they manage to continue it for six months while exercising incredibly poor judgment about spending lots of money on a menial budget is downright unbelievable.

After all this reckless spending, Nina tells them they can't spend the money or they'll be caught, which is advice she should have applied before putting her sons in an elite prep school, but it lets screenwriter Glen Gers show how Bridget's greed contrasts Nina's common sense while completely ignoring everything he's written before it. Plus, it's supposed to be a comedy, but it's one that mopes its way through the planning and the execution of the robbery. There's a kick of energy once they have the money, and Don discovers it almost immediately.

There are some amusing scenes with them recklessly using the money, but then it goes straight back to the continuing heist, complete with a security guard (Roger Cross) who finds out but likes Nina too much to rat, an egotistical head of security (a wasted Stephen Root) who sees everything but what's happening under his nose, and people watching the ladies' every move. The characters have basic traits that should keep us from wanting them to go to prison (except for Bridget, who's just a spoiled WASP), and Gers solves the whole thing by having a lawyer walk into a room, again forgetting what he wrote before that (primarily, that all the characters have already spilled the beans in detail to the cops).

Gers' script is pretty lazy, especially under the microscope of Callie Khouri lackadaisical direction, which is emphasized even more by the fine-enough performances from the three leads. The ending of Mad Money goes back and forth about letting them get away and getting caught until it almost goes beyond not caring either way to only caring when the whole thing will end.