American Hustle - Jamie's review

Christian Bale has already appeared in an 'American' film, fact fans. But Bale's fat, shambling conman Irving Rosenfeld doesn't have much in common with Patrick Bateman other than a propensity for getting other people to believe his lies.

When his new mistress, Amy Adams, gets fingered by a greasy FBI man (a ferociously jerry-curled Bradley Cooper), Rosenfeld has to agree to use his unique skillset to catch more crooks to keep her out of prison. Soon he's in way over his head, and the game is whether he'll figure a way out.

Amercian Hustle, based on the huge Abscam sting which caught a half dozen crooked congressmen and a senator in the 1970s, is a light and lively affair with plenty of outrageous vintage fashion (obese kipper ties compete with giant haircuts and plunging necklines for square metres of the cinema screen). It wisely chooses to skip over the fact that Rosenfeld was a despicable conman who cheated desperate people out of their savings, preferring to cast him as a sympathetic sadsack on heart pills who loves his son, is browbeaten by his manic wife (Jennifer Lawrence, on top form still/again) and who just wants the ride to stop.

What sets Hustle apart from other films in the con genre (apart from the top notch cast, which also includes Jeremy Renner as a likeable mayor and Louis CK as a doormat of an FBI chief) is its startling decision to show what makes the con artists tick. It's the most nakedly emotional con man movie ever made. Even the best of them (e.g. The Grifters, The Sting and pretty much anything by Mamet) fail on that front because a con movie almost always ends with a reveal that one character was fooling another all along.

But though it's only apparent in retrospect, Hustle dispenses with fakery and shows its grifters at their most vulnerable. Bale and Adams are messy people who don't hide their needs and dreams at all. They may fool their marks, but they don't try to fool each other or the audience.