Viewed in
2011
Formats
Cable TV
Premise
John Cusack stars as a con artist who gets stuck in a triangle with his girlfriend (Annette Bening) and mother (Angelica Huston), both also con artists.
Liked
The cast.
Disliked
The plot.
Thoughts
As much as I love Cusack, this movie was kind of "meh".
I liked the performances by the big three. Huston and the perpetually naked Bening played modern day femme fatales very well, despite the bland dialog and lack of film noir visual flair.
The story was somewhat interesting, and all three enigmatic characters had mysterious pasts. While they weren't despicable crooks, they weren't exactly huggable either. Director Stephen Frears kept them afar from the camera, which I think contributed to my detachment from the characters.
Even though I found the premise intriguing, the pacing was quite intolerable. It felt like not much happened throughout most of the movie, and then concluded with an abrupt ending that came out of left field. I assume that's how the novel went, but it didn't work at all cinematically.
There were some amusing moments, such as seeing Cusack's ubiquitous buddy, Jeremy Piven as a soldier. Another amusing aspect was seeing how outdated some of the plot points were since the setting took place before the days of cell phones.
So yeah. It didn't suck, but it wasn't great either. It might be worth checking out if you're a big fan of Cusack, Bening and/or Huston.
What I would change
Made Cusack's character more sympathetic.
