Confidence

Hmmm... I watched it and it sounded a lot like the Sting. And then I watched the documentary that came with the DVD and the screenwriter said that he watched "The Sting" and then wrote this movie.

He basically copied "The Sting." Just that he took out the characters and the ambiance. He added a wasted voice-over.

I think I can imagine the thought process behind this movie: Let's take "the Sting" and give it a noir edge to it. Then we'll update it to modern day LA (even though the screenwriter wanted a cliché-ridden NYC) and we'll include a whole lot of quick cuts and fancy colours because that's what the MTV generation likes these days.

Watch "The Sting" instead. It's much better.

There's this rule in Hollywood that may be unwritten but is nonetheless ironclad: stick to the formula. The hero can't die in a romantic comedy. The drama can't be too funny, and the comedy can't be too sad. Action flicks can't be too deep, and "serious" movies have to be somewhat boring.

On the rare occasions when some movie comes along that breaks these rules, we usually get cinematic excellence. But with Confidence, don't be expecting any deviation from the format. Confidence is a fun, enjoyable, light caper movie. It doesn't pretend to be anything else. And for what it is, it's not half bad.

Edward Burns plays a con man, Jake Vig. Together with his crew of seasoned, confident fellow con men, he scams people out of money. Lots of money. And of course, sooner or later he's bound to pick the wrong person to scam. In this case it's a seemingly innocuous accountant who just happens to work for a mob kingpin, cheesily called "the King" (but played brilliantly by Dustin Hoffman). In a tight spot, Jake agrees to do a con and split the proceeds with the King, to get him off his back. What follows is the usual series of crosses, double-crosses, and triple-crosses while everyone tries to figure out who to trust and who's about to screw who over.

When I say that Confidence follows the rules, I mean it. Crime capers must have wise-talking characters. This does. Crime capers must be stylish. This is. Crime capers must have the token female, whose role is to be sexy but not too sexy. Rachel Weisz fills the part here, and does a decent job at it. (Other such token women included Julia Roberts in Ocean's Eleven, and Angela Bassett in The Score). Crime capers must make the audience scratch their heads trying to piece it all together, but must not make them think about any deeper moral issues of right and wrong. Again, Confidence lives up to that deal on both counts.

Still, it was fun escapist entertainment. And, without giving away too much of the ending, let's just say that I'm always impressed with a movie that manages to surprise me. That alone makes it worth seeing.

'Confidence' is an empty exercise in style. Based on a crooks scheme story filmed with some skill, and acted pretty decently by a good cast, it soon falls in routine and looks like a useless effort. The film is too technical and never succeeds to make us care about the characters or to entangle us in the grip of the plot. Even the final twist in the story comes too late - they lost us already, and good chances are that the spectator went out of the theater, or took the DVD out of the player already. 6/10 on my personal scale. Can be avoided.

Ed Burns has "Confidence" in this 2003 film also starring Dustin Hoffman, Andy Garcia, Rachel Weisz, Paul Giametti, and Donal Logue.

Burns is Jake Vig, a professional grifter who, with the help of his usual crew, has just swindled a ton of money from a mark. Unfortunately for Jake and his group of merry men -- which includes two LA cops - the mark was an accountant for a crime boss, Winston King. Not a nice guy. And two of Jake's men wind up dead.

Jake doesn't have much choice but to go to King and offer to pull off another huge job that will not only make King a fortune but pay him back. He chooses a banker, Morgan Price, and for this job, he brings in Lily (Weisz). Then Jake finds out an old Federal nemesis of his (Garcia) is following his every move and determined to bring him down.

For what it is, "Confidence" is an okay movie with good performances. It doesn't break any new ground but it's entertaining. And of course, it has the ubiquitous twists. Nowadays there's no suspense or thriller without a few twists. I will say, one I could predict, the other I didn't.

A mediocre script that is saved by the performances of its actors. Ed Burns does pretty good job as the lead in this film and Dustin Hoffman whose brief appearance here shows how a true legend works. Rachel Weisz makes this film a lot of fun with her performance as a sexy female con, and Andy Garcia continues to make himself into one of the great character actors of our generation. The big problem this movie has is its script, and the plot holes and continuity problems that come with it. You can tell that the story really was not though out well, and you can see the rewrites in some of the scenes in the film. Maybe if the script were more though out, we would have had a better movie than we have here right now.