Confidence movie review & film summary (2003)

Jake's last name, Vig, is possibly short for "vigorish," the word gamblers use to describe the money the house takes off the top. If I were looking for someone to play with $200,000 of my money, I don't think I would choose a con man named Vig. But the King is confident that no one would even dream of cheating him, because he has such a fearsome reputation. And to keep an eye on Jake, he sends along his henchman Lupus (Franky G) to watch Jake's every move.

Dustin Hoffman's performance as the King is the best thing in the movie--indeed, the only element that comes to life on the screen, screen, instead of in a twice-told tale. The King runs a strip club as a front, launders money for the mob, and suffers from Attention Deficit Disorder--or, as he meticulously specifies, "Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder." To control his condition, he takes pills that slow him way down. "Feel my heart," he says to one of the strippers in his club, to prove that it is hardly beating. Hoffman, chewing gum, wearing a beard and glasses, looks like the gnome from hell, and fast-talks his way into a brilliant supporting performance.

So brilliant, I couldn't help wondering how much energy the film would have gained if Hoffman, say, had played the lead instead of Burns. With Hoffman, you look at him and try to figure out what he's thinking. With Burns, you look at him and either you already know, or he doesn't make you care. Burns is the right actor for a lot of roles, especially young men tortured by the pangs of romance, but as a con man he lacks the shadings and edges. Once again, the comparison is with Joe Mantegna in "House of Games." Jake Vig's crew includes fellow hoods Gordo (Paul Giamatti) and Miles (Brian Van Holt). He has recently enlisted Lily (Rachel Weisz), who is very pretty and who he likes--two ominous signs for a con man. And when he needs two guys to turn up and pretend to be Los Angeles cops, he has two real cops (Donal Logue and Luis Guzman) to play the role. There is also the enigmatic federal agent Gunther Butan (Andy Garcia), whose name means "butane" in German, and who spends a great deal of time re-lighting his cigar. Butan has been on Jake's tail for years, we learn, although he may simply represent a higher level in the game.

"Confidence" is a jerk-around movie, a film that works by jerking us around. I don't mind being misled and fooled in a clever way, especially when the movie makes me care about the characters before pulling the rug out from under them, or me. But there is no sense of risk here. No real stakes. It's all an entertainment, even for the characters, and at the end of the movie, as one surprise after another is revealed, there is no sense that these amazing revelations are really happening; no, they're simply the screenplay going through its final paces so the audience will appreciate the full extent to which it has been duped. What a shame, that such a well-made movie is never able to convince us it is anything more than merely well-made.