American Hustle

Irving Rosenfeld is a devious con man. For years he's been dealing in forged art and a shady loan shark business, all while keeping a legit dry cleaning business as a front. His wife, Rosalyn, knows about his under the table dealings, but has quietly put up with it since he takes care of her and her son.

For a while, things go smoothly for Irving and Rosalyn until Irving has a chance encounter with a femme fatale named Sydney Prosser. Sydney and Irving engage in a sordid affair, and Sydney eventually encourages Irving to branch out in his loan shark business. Irving does so with Sydney as his partner. Things go well from there until they catch the attention of power-hungry FBI agent Richie DeMaso. DeMaso makes a deal with Irving and Sydney: help him make four busts in a FBI con scheme of their own, and they can walk free.

Nothing is quite as it seems in David O. Russell's cautionary tale based on a true story of the Abscam scandal in 1981. Abscam saw seven U.S. congressmen convicted on charges of bribery. In this elaborate retelling of the events, every single person involved on both sides of the scam has some sort of ulterior motive which drives them, often with disastrous results. Irving wants to provide for his family, especially his adopted son. Sydney wants Irving to herself and continue to live her life as a con artist. Agent Richie greatly desires power and the fame that comes with it. On the other side of the scam, New Jersey Mayor Carmine Polito tries to find a way to create jobs for the citizens of his town. Each of these players in the con game have good intentions, however they fall into the trap of constantly making bad decisions to achieve their goals.

On the surface American Hustle looks like a slick, fun retelling of true events that in a convoluted way are reminiscent of the storyline of Ocean's 11 and it's two sequels. While that is partly a good description of American Hustle, it is also a cautionary tale of how desperate people can be when pushed to their breaking points. Seeing each of these people make such horrible decisions and face the consequences of those decisions is admittedly slightly depressing. The good thing, however, is David O. Russell does not paint their actions in a positive light and try to make excuses for them. Instead, he simply tells a story of how each of them got to that certain point of desperation. Unlike David's previous film, Silver Linings Playbook, the depressing factor actually helps the film instead of taking away from it. In Silver Linings, none of the characters seem repentant of their ways and there does not seem to be a satisfying "everything is going to be ok" kind of ending (that might have been the point for all I know, but for me it did not work). In American Hustle, each of the characters seemed genuinely wanting to change for the better. And that is what makes American Hustle worthwhile.