Film Review: “American Hustle”

Based on a true story, “American Hustle” opens in a
semi-documentary manner, with a line of on-screen prose providing the location
— the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan — and the date — November, 1978. Some
intermittent voice-over narration from the two major characters throughout the movie continues the documentary tone. After
that, however, both action and people grow increasingly, even outrageously
extreme, in part through the sheer zaniness of subject and theme.

In that opening scene, Irving Rosenfeld (Christian Bale)
painstakingly arranges an elaborate hairdo, involving a comb-over and a toupee,
a comical moment that suggests the vanity of the man and the deception of his
deeds. Irving informs the audience that he owns a string of dry-cleaning shops,
runs a sideline in fake paintings, and augments that with some not entirely
clear business in bilking people through false investments. He also introduces
his accomplice and lover, Sydney Prosser (Amy Adams), a former stripper who
shares Irving’s ambitions and larcenous instincts; their alternating narration
moves the plot through flashbacks, showing the events that led up to their
arrest by the FBI, in the person of agent Richie DiMaso
(Bradley Cooper).

In exchange for leniency, DiMaso
pressures the couple to participate in a scheme to nail a batch of politicians
for corruption, which brings the movie’s plot up to the moment of Irving’s
coiffure. They embark on an operation aimed at the mayor of Camden, New Jersey,
Carmine Polito (Jeremy Renner), who wants to bring
gambling casinos to Atlantic City in order to boost employment and reinvigorate
the state’s economy. To entrap some members of Congress, they also use an agent
impersonating an Arab sheik, who promises to bankroll the plan to the tune of
$2 million, introducing yet another level of trickery.

All of this maneuvering initiates a
number of conflicting, often comical plots — DiMaso
constantly cajoles his boss into paying for luxury accommodations, fancy cars,
a jet plane, and providing the $2 million. He also falls in love with Sydney
and tries to squeeze Irving out of the operation, thus advancing his own
career. At the same time, since the whole plan involves political corruption,
gambling casinos, and a lot of money, the mafia naturally joins the game,
raising yet another level of deception and danger.

The various double and triple crosses, the pervasive sense
that everybody lies and  assumes another
identity, and the various threats to life and limb paradoxically keep tipping
the movie over into comedy. Irving’s dizzy wife, Rosalyn (Jennifer Lawrence),
cannot work in her kitchen without accidentally setting it on fire; the
excitable, aggressive Richie, who bullies his boss, actually lives with his
mother and creates his own elaborate hairdo. The notion that everybody works a
confidence game on everybody else, that con men con each other, leads to some
surprising and laughable twists and resolutions to an essentially funny movie
about some serious subjects.

Director David O. Russell exploits the era of “American
Hustle” carefully and conscientiously, showing the distinctive clothing, the
awful disco music and dancing, and yes, the hairstyles of a time that seems
long, long ago. Amy Adams and Jennifer Lawrence, both beautiful young women in
different ways, wear dresses with enough cleavage to challenge the Grand
Canyon. Much of Christian Bale’s performance in effect grows out of his loud,
clashing wardrobe and his oversized eyeglasses, which become a reiterated
characterizing prop.

Although just about everyone goes way over the top much of
the time, Bale’s acting deserves a good deal of praise, especially in its
demonstration of his remarkable versatility. After playing the lean, laconic,
haunted protagonist of “Out of the Furnace,” he impersonates a flamboyant,
fast-talking confidence artist from the Bronx with absolute conviction. He
clearly gained a lot of weight for this part — contrasting with his previous
role, his Irving Rosenfeld is paunchy and physically unimpressive, faintly
ridiculous even in serious moments, yet working his character so thoroughly
that he deceives the audience as fully as his fellow hustlers. His character,
along with all the others in “American Hustle,” the complicated scheming, and
its surprising results, suggest the truth of W.C. Fields’s dictum, “You can’t
cheat an honest man.” As it turns out, few of those populate this movie.

This article appears in Dec 18-24, 2013.