JUST DOIN' THE "AMERICAN HUSTLE" TO SURVIVE...

“I don’t know what all the fuss is about” complained Mom as I talked to her on the phone the other day. “It’s just another heist movie isn’t it? I got bored, quite frankly, I didn’t even finish it.” I tutted at that, I highly disapprove of not finishing films. I have done it only two or three times in my life, usually when I felt a migraine coming on. Having recently watched American Hustle, I feel the team putting the film together was well aware that there are a lot of heist films out there. It’s a tricky one really, because heist films have a legitimate fan base for their own sake. But if you want to step above and beyond that fan base you need to do something different.       Something different that, at the same time, is not going to change the basic structure so much that it doesn’t alienate the fan base. American Hustle has actually negotiated that fine line very successfully – hence the Oscar nomination. There are those who, like Mom, are completely sick of heist movies but well… You get those in every genre…

Irving Rosenfeld (Christian Bale)  has a nice life all in all. He has a beautiful wife (Jennifer Lawrence) with whom he “fights and f.cks” but ultimately cannot seem to separate from; he has a nice little business running laundrettes with some art dealing on the side… Oh and he’s got a second little side line as a con artist, taking from the rich and desperate and giving to himself. Ok himself and his gorgeous business partner and lover Sydney (Amy Addams). So there he is, rolling along, making a “decent” living when… SLAM. The FBI. He is “nailed” by one of the FBI’s brightest, Richie DiMaso (Bradley Cooper). Now, every hustler knows that everybody, and I mean EVERYBODY has a weakness. The secret to survival lies in finding and abusing it. Richie is over-ambitious. What starts off with a simple trade off with Irving and Sydney – You get me a couple of big fish and I’ll make your charges go away – spirals slowly and steadily out of control as Richie forever sees opportunities to get bigger fish… Irving tries to warn him, not unsubtly, that he is heading into very murky waters but Richie remains stubbornly blinded by future glory… The question is, how far is he prepared to chase these dreams for and how far will he end up falling from?

Now, in one sense this is a common or garden heist film. I can, in that sense, see why Mom got so bored of it. But then, let us not dwell on the similarities. We have already covered that, the movie HAD to do it. The fans would get bored. Let’s concentrate on the stuff the movie did differently. Because, let’s be fair to the movie, it has done a substantial amount.

Now, first up, our hero.  You guys know how much of a Leo DiCaprio fan I am right? Right. I have to begrudgingly admit that although Leo is the main guy I support this year… Well… I won’t be that upset of Christian Bale gets it. I may even be rooting for him a tiny bit. Because as the heroes of heist movies go, Irving is quite a character. First of all, no Ocean’s 11 style smooth, handsome hero here. Irving is overweight and has a “killer” comb-over that gets a good few pages of dialogue all to itself. He has a beautiful blonde “dolly bird” wife sure. But what is different is, he has a COMPLICATED relationship with her. It’s a love-hate relationship, she’s depressed, is she an adequate mother? These are matters that ACTUALLY preoccupy us. We get to really know our characters in this film, as opposed to just reverting to stock characters and using all our previous knowledge to just assume what they’re like and move on. I mean then there’s Sydney. Her relationship with all the characters involved. You literally never know where she’s going to turn next, I mean you do, but the story is so cleverly designed that even a cynic like me had her misgivings.

And while we’re on the subject of characters, let’s have a word or two about Richie DiMaso. There are two types of possible cop in these movies. Ye can have the conscientious “good cop”, the hard-working, beetling antithesis to our “wise guy” heroes, like the police officers in The Wolf of Wall Street. These guys ultimately either win the day a la Wall Street or our heroes run rings round them, kinda like a Road Runner cartoon. Or, we are made to “hate” the cop so that we love the villain all the more – and ultimately the villain usually gets away. Richie… Is neither!  I mean ok, he is a sub-genre of the second variety. Ultimately he does get on our nerves. He is that over-ambitious type in the office who thinks, after taking two successful steps he is basically the best there is. Better than everyone. He has it coming to him a mile away and you know what, you kinda enjoy the smugness being wiped off his face. But at the same time… I’ll let you discover it for yourself but he has a bit of tough life. He is a bit of a “loser” in movie terms (and God knows I hate that term in real life but I’m trying to make a point here) but… Eh, he’s grey. He’s not black or white. Which makes this movie so great.

American Hustle is a fun, solid mix of something old and something new. It very successfully take a genre where it’s generally “goodies vs baddies” and made it… Well made it closer to real life. All the characters across the board have very real personalities and original personal tales. No one is a “stock” character. There is a lot of grey and not much in the way of black and white. I mean yes, this has meant giving up on originality in other areas sometimes but, like we said at the beginning, we can’t afford to lose the fans now, can we? J Soo yeah. I guess I’m ok with it getting a pat on the head. I’m not “outraged” about the nominations. I’ll have something to say if it actually gets all ten Oscars® it is nominated for but for that, dear ones, we have to wait for next week… 

THE CLOSER YOU LOOK, THE LESS YOU SEE : "NOW YOU SEE ME"

For my first trick tonight, I will make two hours of your life disappear J Wow, ok, that came out a tad bit darker than I intended it to. But you know what I mean. You sit down to watch a film, what with the dazzling special effects (yes, I know, I do moan about special effects a lot but you can’t beat them when they’re well used), glamorous actors and a whirlwind of a storyline, you’ll be walking out of the cinema scratching your head before you became fully conscious of ever sitting down.

It all starts, you see, with four illusionists (Jesse Eisenberg, Isla Fisher, Woody Harrelsson and David Franco). They have banded together to form a troupe entitled “The Four Horsemen” – and for their tour around Las Vegas they use “magic” to “rob banks”. An amusing gimmick and nothing more, right? Well, possibly not. As the banks the four horsemen say they are robbing on stage in front of a live audience indeed start turning up empty the next morning, the police force (headed by Mark Ruffalo) is faced with the very same perplexing question we are all faced with at the end of magic shows (I know I’m supposed to call them mentalists or illusionists or whatever. For me, they will always ever be magicians. Sorry J ) : “How the heck did they do that?”  But with even one of the most famous “illusionist de-maskers” (Morgan Freeman) baffled by the turn of events and the possibility of an agenda that stretches way beyond just the cash… Is this simply a rather glamorous set of heists? Or is there actually something a lot bigger at stake?

Ok, quick question: Did you like the Ocean’s franchise? You did? Then jump right on the bandwagon my friends! This is most definitely one for you! And I mean, don’t get me wrong, I loved the Ocean’s films. But this is a tad bit better methinks. First of all, I like the fact that it doesn’t rely so much on star power. I mean don’t get me wrong there are one heck of a lot of stars in this one too. There are even a few I couldn’t get into the blurb like Michael Cane for example. But there are not 15 of them.  Which, in my view is a good thing. I mean 15 a-list celebrities are all very well and good – in fact in some cases but it always makes me a tad nervous about the rest of the film. You know, the directing, the storyline, the effects… I know it’s a tad unfair, but I always get the nagging question “what are they trying to hide?” – you know. If they’re throwing that much talent at it, my head reasons, there must be something going not quite right with it. Now this little number has a significant amount of star talent in the mix, you can ask what it’s trying to hide until you are blue in the face; I am pretty darn confident you won’t get it.

This is not simply because there is nothing that is obviously wrong with it; I have to say that this was one of the best heist  /stroylines I have seen in a very long time. I know that technology and development allows us to design visual effects gimmicks that are more intricate than ever before, but this was truly spectacular. And all the visuals – be it the effects all the stars – definitely do not retract from a complicated plotline you will literally “not see coming” until the very end. But don’t worry. There is a an actual “explanation”  bit very neatly inserted into the film so I can guarantee you won’t get completely lost.  This is actually my favourite kind of plot. I don’t like it when I can see films “coming” a mile away. And my “eyesight” is pretty darn good what with one thing and another  (mainly the sheer volume of films I have watched in my life).

If I were to say one negative thing about the film, it might be that it suffers from a slight lack of character development. I’m not going to go as far as saying they are “stock characters” they definitely are not, but… I mean we could, in an ideal world, get to know them a tad bit better. But then again, that is not what the movie is about. The movie is about the show – that’s why this is what the movie concentrates on. Which is fair enough, I think.

So next time you have a few hours to spare, feel free to spare it on this little number. You will not regret it – this much I promise you.