TWO AND A HALF GLASS REVIEW: AMERICAN HUSTLE…

TWO AND A HALF GLASS REVIEW:

AMERICAN HUSTLE

25.01.2014

It’s not that I didn’t like American Hustle.

I think I liked it.

I think.

I just…have been sitting on the fence all week void of any real opinion. I’ve been talking it over with folk, I’ve been lying awake in bed at night, staring at the ceiling anxiously fretting “WHAT DO I THINK OF THIS?!”. Oh the troubled life I lead.

I keep comparing American Hustle to Wolf of Wall Street – it’s pretty easy to compare – big awards film, set in a retro age of excess and illegality and bad taste.

But still – despite all of the things I didn’t like about WOWS I still feel that it had more substance, more sticking power – gimmicky sex, dwarf throwing and Jonah Hill’s penis aside.

But at least I came out of WOWS with an opinion, some feelings on the matter – which is something you want from any art – a stirring of emotion, be it love or hate.

See, American Hustle is like that guy you’ve been kinda seeing for the past six weeks. It’s not that he’s bad or anything, he hasn’t really done anything wrong. You’re just not sure.

I feel the only thing for it, as you would with this “meh” worthy boyfriend, is to write a pro and con list and see what we come out with:

PROS:

• The acting was good. The actors are good. The cast is good. It’s all good.
• It’s not too long. I know that makes me sound like a toddler. But this matters.
• Cool soundtrack
• Strong, independent female characters who had a decent sized role and part in the story *HI-5 LADIES*.
• Visually authentic for the period…. In that slightly brown and nicotine stained 1970’s way.
• Complete sexy costume porn. There must have been a LOT of double sided tape used on Amy Adams (hi and a big shout out to those people who have stumbled across this review via a google search for “Jennifer Lawrence sex boob porn” – this isn’t probably what you were looking for…
  but I hope you like reading).

CONS: 

• I believe Jennifer Lawrence was cast wrong. I love the J-Law, I do! She’s too young and soft for this role. She’s adorable and gorgeous but I almost feel that her and Amy Adams could have swapped parts.
• Also, I don’t think J-Law’s role was enough to warrant the award nominations she’s been getting. She’s basically being nominated for yelling “fuck” at a microwave, having one decent crying scene and talking a shit load about her funky smelling fingers…no no no…WAIT…that sounded all kinds of wrong…I mean that her fingers smell of trash…I mean, she talks about nail polish A LOT. Really, she does.

• After seeing Silver Linings Playbook last year and saying “huh – Bradley Cooper isn’t so bad after all” my opinion of him has once again dived. Don’t bloody well ask me why, buddy, I just don’t trust that guy.
• On the subject of ol’ Brad – why does he keep getting “sexiest man” labels in magazines. Are you crazy? Urgh. You can have him.
• After being bombarded with the trailer before every film for the past few months, having now seem the film, it’s almost like they made a real kick-ass trailer, without a film, and then had to make a movie to fit in with the trailer. You know? All of the best stuff; the fights, the dancing, the action – it’s all packed into the trailer. Is there some kind of saying about not giving away the cookies or milk or something? Yeah! The trailer was the milk to the American Hustle cow.

• Same kind of thing with the soundtrack – perhaps one night David o’ Russell made a playlist on Spotify called ‘Dave’s sweet 1970’s mega-mix’ and that’s how the trailer, then the film were born .
• The “hustle” itself…well it’s pretty boring. I don’t care about the hustle. I just want to see moreJennifer Lawrence throwing shit and Amy Adams in bangin’ fur coats.
• The details of the “hustle” were a tad murky in places…it didn’t seem to make complete sense all of the time… but it didn’t matter, as it didn’t actually affect the story. Which only goes to prove that the hustle was boring and not significant enough.

Okay – so after that – I STILL don’t know. I guess, I’ll pick this over WOWS just because it’s shorter, has a number of actors I’m pretty fond of, and it’s not as indulgent.

What I do know is that after having now seen a decent number of this years award hubbub films, it’s increasingly irking me that clearly the best films of the year don’t win anything and seldom get nominated due to the fact that they are too small, or just don’t have the studio backing.

Awards season is dominated by those films that the producers and studios WANT to be nominated, They hold their release dates, they give them bigger marketing budgets, they simply throw more money at them. If WOWS or American Hustle were released mid way through the year, they’d get some press but I don’t feel they’d be nominated for shit.

This has always been the case, but I am an optimist (despite all of my moaning) and I thought it wasn’t true, but having been taking extra notice of award season the past few years…my faith is shaken.

NOW I do have to say that the award season films that I want to see most are not out in NZ yet – and I feel will probably be much better and worthy of the kudos than what I’ve seen so far: Dallas Buyers Club, 12 Years a Slave and Her. Hopefully they’re out soon.

 RATING:

Three glasses of pinot noir

 SHOULD YOU GO AND SEE IT?

*shrugs*

2014 FILMS RANKING TO 31-01-14:

1. Nebraska

2. August: Osage County

3. American Hustle

4. Wolf of Wall Street

NEXT WEEK : Philomena. 

xo