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HUSTLERS (2019)

CAST
JENNIFER LOPEZ
CONSTANCE WU
CARDI B
TRACE LYSETTE
KEKE PALMER
LILI REINHART
DAVID RATRAY
MERCEDES RUEHL
JULIA STILES
METTE TOWLEY
WAI CHING HO
FRANK WHALEY

BASED ON THE MAGAZINE ARTICLE BY
JESSICA PRESSLER

SCREENPLAY BY
LORENE SCAFARIA

PRODUCED BY
JESSICA ELBAUM
WILL FERRELL
ELAINE GOLDSMITH-THOMAS
JENNIFER LOPEZ
ADAM McKAY
BENNY MEDINA

DIRECTED BY
LORENE SCAFARIA

GENRE
BIOGRAPHY
CRIME
DRAMA

RATED
AUS:MA
UK:15
USA:R

 

 

An incredibly icky enterprise, Hustlers treats its based-on-true-story subjects with an almost heroic lens, writer & director Lorene Scafaria refusing to properly delve into the morally troubling actions of her characters.

The characters in Hustlers are criminals. Strippers by trade who went pouty after the recession scared their clientele away, they would go on to drug and rob a succession of Wall Street types, under the guise of pseudo-moralistic payback for the 2008 financial crisis. Writer and director Lorene Scafaria (The Meddler) instead view’s these women as working-class anti-heroes. They are just taking what is there’s in an unjust world where everyone is “doing the dance” for the green. It is a stance that is both false and hypocritical, and looms like a dark shadow over the movie.

Hustlers stars Constance Wu as Destiny, a stripper from Las Vegas who moves to New York City for greener (as in one-dollar-bills) pastures. She is taken under the wing of veteran stripper Ramona (Jennifer Lopez), whose charismatic personality, knowledge of the stripping game, and other “assets” has her rolling in dollar bills night after night. When the 2008 recession hits and their clientele scrambles away, Destiny & Ramona conduct a plan to fleece rich men by drugging and robbing them of their money.

While there are flashes of consequence and remorse from these G-string clad criminals, Scafaria firmly takes the position that their actions are not only justified, but an “empowering” form of feminist wiles in action. Often resembling a hip-hop music video and filled with the same depth, Hustlers is obsessed with the notion that money claimed by villainous means is morally justified, so long as the targets of such extortion fits the profile of the “bad guy”, which in this case is Wall Street brokers and CEOs.

What is odd is how Scafaria refuses to acknowledge that the same money scammed from investors through nefarious means, is the very same money that these women stole for their own gloating profit. It is a clear case of sin begetting sin, yet Scafaria views the greed and deception of her female characters as virtues in the sisterhood.

Performances wise there is little to recommend. Constance Wu comes across as cold and rigid, while Jennifer Lopez doesn’t deliver anything we haven’t seen before. Her scantily clad dance routines are really no different than what she has previously delivered in her music videos. Exactly how Hustlers is receiving serious discussion in the awards race is baffling, especially in the case of Lopez. Kind of ironic how Hustlers has hustled a whole industry into thinking it was anything of worth.

**

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