Tricks

Roy (Nicolas Cage) has some problems. He suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder, panic attacks, and gets totally hysterical when people leave doors open, don't take off their shoes, get mud on his carpet, etc. He takes pills for the many problems, but he accidentally knocked them down the garbage disposal and is a big frantic mess now, complete with nervous ticks of the face and exclamations of "mmm..." at the end of his sentences.

That's a problem that severely interferes with his job as a con artist. He's not a con man, he's not a rip-off man, he's a con artist, with added emphasis on the "artist" part. He views his job as a beauty, a sort of majestic way of expressing himself, but not really, that's a lie, it's just something that makes him sleep better at night.

He hates his job because it makes him feel dirty. It's not fun ripping off old people or fat people, but he is a high school drop out, how else can he get a decent paying job?

His partner, Frank Mercer (Sam Rockwell), is a bit more at ease than Roy. He doesn't seem to mind his job all that much. Roy, on the other hand, is turning into a complete nut, and after going to a recommended psychiatrist, he musters up the courage to confront his 14-year-old daughter, Angela (Alison Lohman), who is eager to escape her controlling mother and check out her long-lost big pop.

The film has a lot of different stories going on -- the worry-wart who learns to put aside his nervous ticks, the long-lost father who reunites with his daughter, and the con artist who tries to give it up for a normal life. They all succeed as a story, but the film's only flaw is its wandering, which goes on far too long.

Who cares (and I mean that as a statement, not a question). The film is one of the great entertainments of the year. It has twists, turns, and a big streak of enjoyability running through it.

Nicolas Cage is on a winning streak. First 2002's Oscar-winning "Adaptation," now this (rumored to be entered into the Oscar race for 2004). Who would'a thunk it?

Sam Rockwell ("Confessions of a Dangerous Mind") continues to impress, while Alison Lohman (a 20-something actress playing a teenager) shines and convincingly portrays exactly what the character needs.

Ridley Scott ("Alien"), the infamous British director, uses some great camera techniques here -- filmed in a blue shade with lots of different camera flashes, he subtly forces the audience into Roy's head, especially during sequences when Roy is having little breakdowns and the people and objects around him start moving at warp-speed.

I'll admit that I'm a big fan of con man movies because I find them amusing. But "Matchstick Men" is not really a con man movie -- it's a movie about a con man who has to cope with his job and private life. And a movie about a con man who finds he has a daughter. And a con man who gets conned. It's all enjoyable, and though the film is long, I never felt very bored by it at all -- it sustained my interest throughout its running time. That's rarer and rarer nowadays.

Nicolas Cage plays Roy, a con artist, who has numerous psychological issues. He is an obsessive-compulsive con artist, with an insane need for neatness. Roy also suffers from agoraphobia, yet despite these problems, is an efficient con man. Much like in Luc Besson's Leon (1994), Matchstick Men adopts the same theme of a criminal figure taking in a young female apprentice. Although after the exciting exposition the film has a rather drab middle, the conclusion is stunning. This film is one of Nicolas Cage's finest, whom I have long questioned as to ability in acting. Alison Lohman does a fine job as Angela. Due to the spectacular finish, I am going to give this film ***1/2 / **** or 8/10.

The little problem that 'Matchstick Men' has is that there is not a real highpoint in the movie if the ending wasn't there. I think the movie starts as a very good movie. Roy Waller (Nicolas Cage) and Frank Mercer (Sam Rockwell) are con artists and the movie opens with showing how they collect some money. It is not as great as how George Clooney does it in 'Out of Sight' but it's a lot of fun. After this the movie shows who Roy is, a guy with all kind of weird things. Spasms, panic attacks, compulsive behavior. He wants things clean, he wants things a certain way, or he becomes a little crazy. He has pills for these things but he loses them and this is how he meets Dr. Klein (Bruce Altman), a psychiatrist.

Because of him Roy learns he has a 14-year old daughter Angela (Alison Lohman, who was actually 24). He wants to care for her, spend time with her, and even reveals what he really is. In a great scene she shows her father and us how she would be if she had the same job as Roy. Roy and Frank have a big job planned where they would collect 80,000 dollars from a guy named Frechette (Bruce McGill). In a way they are taking money but Roy looks at it differently. He thinks, and he is actually right, that they just give it to him. Because it is all illegal they can't complain after they are cheated.

Hoe these three big stories fit in one you have to see for yourself. The middle part is a little slow, but the ending makes up for that. All characters are played very well and Nicolas Cage is great. Ridley Scott has made another fine movie.

I know he won an Oscar for another film (don't get me started on that!), but this performance is really the one I regard as his crowning achievement. He's so convincing as a man who's totally out of control even when he appears to be in control that it's like a spinning top which doesn't really look like it's moving fast at all.

Sam Rockwell and Cage are partners, if you can call Cage's tic laden role a man who ever really connects with anybody at all. They con for a living and are quite accomplished at the game. So when his new challenge, a teenage daughter he had no contact with up till now, enters and shakes up his OCD world, this walking, talking repetitive routine he calls life gets flipped over into something resembling a normal existence.

The great Bruce McGill appears as someone you don't want to cross, unless it's out of his way to avoid the inevitable trouble. He fakes humbleness and charisma perfectly until the cobra he really is gets uncoiled and strikes.

This is an odd choice for Ridley Scott to direct. I'm glad he made it, as this film is as great socio-comedically as "Blade Runner" was poignantly techno-emotional. "Matchstick Men" gets under your skin, in funny and tragic ways, usually simultaneously. There really are men out there like Cage's Roy, as disturbing as that might be. Here Cage gets to be a three dimensional person and not just the human function of a lame action formula.

Reviewing a movie like Matchstick Men is tough because it's a con movie and as such I really can't go into the plot all that much. So, I'll just give a quick little synopsis of the plot, but really if you've seen any trailers for the movie, you know the plot pretty well.

Nicolas Cage plays Roy, a con man (or, as he likes to say, a Con Artist!) who has a lot of problems. For one, he's a compulsive cleaner, he hates the outdoors and he has lot of ticks Roy needs medication to keep him sane.

One day he knocks his pills into the sink and when he calls his doctor to get more he finds out that his doctor is no longer in town! This provides one of the funnier/saddest part of the movie. I'm not sure if it was suppose to be played up for laughs or not, the tone was kind of hard to tell, but Roy spend the next day and a half cleaning his house, his ticks got worst and well it made me feel kind of bad for him.

His partner Frank, played by Sam Rockwell provides him with the number for another psychologist who can help. Roy goes to the psychologist thinking that it'll be easy, to just ask for the pills and he'll get them. No, this guy wants to help Roy and will not give him any pills until he talks. Which, I must say, shows two things. One, Nick Cage is great when he plays these type of rolls, and two, he's damn funny. What he tells the psychologist was both funny and sad. During that time though it's reviled that Roy was married at one time, and when his wife left she was pregnant and he doesn't know what happen to the child who would be 14 by now.

After getting the pills (only a weeks worth mind you) Roy decides to find out about his daughter, but he can't because he's too scared, so after getting the number of his ex wife he asks his psychologist to make the call when he can. Later that night he gets a call from him and finds out that he has a daughter who wants to meet him.

That's as far as I'll go with the plot because the movie really picks up from there as he bonds with his new daughter and sets up a really complex and dangerous con.

Like I said, Nick Cage is great in the movie, but I also want to point out that his daughter, Angela (played by Alison Lohman) was just fantastic to watch. She really lit up the screen when she smiled and it looked like Alison Lohman was just having a ball playing her. She was your typical 14 year old (only, and this shocked me when I found out, Alison Lohman is 24 years old! If you watch it, keep that in mind and tell me she doesn't look like a 14 year old.) who knew just how to work her dad! Some of the funnier moments came after he would yell at her, then she'd start to cry and Roy would just completely collapse and start apologizing for what he said, even if he was completely right! It was just really funny.

Matchstick Men isn't a fast paced movie, it's more of a character study between Roy and Angela and how she changes his life and makes him reprioritizes his values and the way he runs his life.