Entertaining but like its' characters empty on the inside.

Rating: 6/10 (24 May 2014)

'American Hustle' is a very curious film, it just doesn't seem to be able to make up its' mind what it wants to be, comedy, drama, heist film? I think the real problem with it is that the 2 central con artists are actually pretty unlikeable, we never end up warming to them in the way the makers obviously want us to do. It's a cliché of many movies that the people who get ripped off are always greedy and unlikeable and therefore we don't feel bad when they fall for it. In 'American Hustle' their scam is to find people who are so desperate for a loan that they're prepared to advance them $5000 as a non-refundable fee (a lot of money back in the late 70s) in the hope they can arrange a much larger loan in order to save their businesses and they never even try to do what they've been paid for? Not exactly Robin Hood? The FBI meanwhile are portrayed as largely a series of conflicting fiefdoms and career opportunists who need this pair of grifters because they lack the kind of street savvy needed to blend in for these types of cases.
On the good side it's probably worth watching this film just to see the amazing transformation of Christian Bale, making this famously handsome actor just unrecognisable. As a Buffy fan it's interesting to see alumni Jeremy Renner, Elizabeth Rhom and Amy Adams all in the same film. The recreation of the 70s is suitably spot on. But in the end it's all rather unsatisfying, we have a series of crooked politicians go to jail but frankly Renner's character is the most likable person in the film and the Mafia get away scot free. It's all nice to look at but ultimately vapid.