Review // American Hustle

With his third feature film since returning to the screen in 2010, David O. Russell swings for the fences, and mostly succeeds.  The riotous, sprawling American Hustle follows con man Irving Rosenfeld (Christian Bale) who, along with his accent-swapping partner Sydney Prosser (Amy Adams) are recruited by the FBI and used to entrap power brokers and politicians in 1970s New Jersey.  Together with bumbling agent Richie DiMaso (Bradley Cooper) the pair ingratiate themselves with Jersey mayor Carmine Polito (Jeremy Renner) concocting a plan to rebuild Atlantic City with the help of a – fictional – Arab sheik.  Things, of course, do not go as planned, and as the elaborate web of lies crumbles around them it’s survival of the shrewdest in this raucous dark comedy.

You have to give David O. Russell credit.  After a directing career with some real ups and downs he has made a name for himself with an exceptional ability to balance comedy and drama within a single film.  Last year’s Silver Linings Playbook took a conventional romantic comedy plot line and transformed it into heartfelt and hilarious look at mental illness.  With the first few minutes of American Hustle the name Scorsese might come to mind, but as the film moves forward a more apt comparison might be Robert Altman.  With the loose, improvised dialogue, the larger than life characters and the near disregard of conventional plot structure, Hustle is propelled forward by the sheer energy of its performances working more as a collection of scenes than a coherent story.

The film’s driving force is Christian Bale.  Again transforming himself physically for a role, Bale’s performance stands out largely because in such a loud, over-the-top picture, Irving is quiet and underplayed.  As his partner, Amy Adams’ Sydney Prosser is the decoy, the seductress, meant to draw your attention…and draw it she does.  Adams has never looked this good on screen.  Her constant flip-flopping between English and American accents is one of the film’s funniest gags, and would certainly reward repeat viewing.  Jennifer Lawrence is magnetic as Irving’s unstable wife Rosalyn.  Pushed to the side by her husband, she spends much of the movie performing for herself, lecturing their son and raging at the “science oven”.  Lawrence is a natural entertainer, and hardly breaks a sweat in most of her scenes, but she feels slightly underused and miscast in the role.  The true stand out is Bradley Cooper.  No one plays raging inferiority and desperate quivering ego quite like Cooper.  Combined with his performance in The Place Beyond The Pines, he has become one of the most enjoyable actors to hate on screen.  Add to this a sympathetic turn by Jeremy Renner, and a hilarious recurring role for Louis CK, and the film boasts one of the strongest ensemble performances of the year.

If there is one place where the film falters it is under the weight of it’s own elaborate story.  Russell’s choice to jump back and forth through time with multiple narrators works well to introduce the main players, but as more characters join the fray – all working towards their own goals – motivations become murky and the stakes are unclear.  The lines between good guys and bad guys are appropriately blurry, but you can’t help wishing for a clear-eyed hero to swoop in and sort things out.  This is a film about ambition, and in a way suffers under it’s own ambitious story-telling.  After over two hours of snake oil the rather quick wrap-up ending seems a little too cute, and a little too easy.

Despite this American Hustle is some of the most fun you’ll have in the theatre all year.  It’s clear from the performances that the actors are having a grand old time.  Russell fills the soundtrack with groovy music of the time period, unafraid to slow down the action and linger on a scene as the classic rock blares.  The costumes are provocative and the hairstyles lush, all evoking an imagined golden age in America.  After quietly returning to form with his last two releases, David O. Russell has announced his presence as one of the finest directors working in Hollywood today, with a film as boisterous and self-involved as Hollywood itself.

Review by Evan Arppe.

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