Movie Review: American Hustle

American Hustle 

Starring:  Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Jennifer Lawrence, Louis C.K., Jack Huston, Michael Peña, Shea Whigham, Alessandro Nivola, Elisabeth Röhm, Paul Herman, Saïd Taghmaoui, Matthew Russell, Thomas Matthews, Adrian Martinez, Anthony Zerbe 

Director: David O. Russell 

Columbia Pictures, Annapurna Pictures, Atlas Entertainment, USA, 2013. 

Irving Rosenfield (Christian Bale) is an con artist, who scams crooked businessmen by promising them loans that require some arranging fees. He gets a collaborator to add some style to his operations, a sexy redhead Sydney Prosser (Amy Adams). Both of them have had to reinvent themselves to survive in life. After an ambitious FBI-agent Richie DiMaso (Bradley Cooper) arrests them, they have to co-operate with him to bust bigger con artists and other criminals. However Richie is planning to have a shining career so he aims to bust the Mayor of New Jersey Carmine Polito (Jeremy Renner) for corruption. After political scandals and economical recession in USA, Irving would rather see things starting to get more optimistic for the people. 

Hairstyle is important for Irving

Irving meets Sydney Prosser

Richie DiMaso and Sydney

Irving and Sydney are lovers, but Irving is blackmailed by his bimboish wife Rosalyn. Sydney gets angry at Irving after hearing that he is married, and starts to seduce Richie to avoid going to jail. The moral problem for Irving is that Carmine is a politician everyone likes and who works to improve his city and create new jobs for the poor people. So Richie is trying to corrupt a good guy to advance his own career. The operation gets larger and things start to get dangerous when the Mob gets involved. 

Rosalyn Rosenfeld with gangster Pete Musane (Jack Huston)

Mayor of New Jersey Carmine Polito

The movie is loosely based on the Abscam (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abscam) operations that FBI used  to combat corruption in the 1970s. After the operation FBI was accused for using entrapment tactics and guidelines for sting operations had to be formed. The acting in the movie is great. While in "The Machinist" Christian Bale was skeleton-thin, this time he is overweight and wears an amusing toupee. Bale is charismatic as Irving and Amy Adams is great as his seducing colleague. Jennifer Lawrence makes a good role as Irving's manipulative wife.  There is also a cameo appearance by Robert De Niro as a Mafia boss. The 1970s cool atmosphere is great with great music and stylish costumes. Also the hairstyles add to film's atmosphere. The movie is an entertaining an interesting caper story in the tradition of classic caper movies.

Robert De Niro has a cameo role as a Mafioso

Rating: Very good