Matchstick Men (2003)

Movies about con men usually find space in my heart, and this one's no different -- it's shot through with a jittery intensity that keeps expectations on edge even as you realize how low-key the whole thing actually is. The downside to all that edginess is that you know SOMETHING eventually has to happen, and I had the ending more or less mapped out thirty minutes in. So the crackerjack first two acts is slightly let down by the prosaic conclusion (call it the Mamet Eventuality)... but even then, there's a surprisingly touching epilogue, where we realize that the film has been conning us on what it's really trying to show (to borrow a Mamet line, it's about purity). Still nice to see Nicolas Cage returning to the twitchy adventurous stuff he used to do before winning an Oscar gave him a license to mope and blow shit up; Alison Lohman scarily convincing as a fourteen-year-old, considering she's older than I am. Minor, but at least it's better than Confidence.

Grade: B