Hustle without Flow

Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson attempt to strike comedic gold in director Chris Addison’s ‘The Hustle’ a female-centric remake of Frank Oz’s 1988 comedy ‘Dirty Rotten Scoundrels’ starring Steve Martin and Michael Caine.  Lambasted by the critics (currently 15 percent rotten on RT, ouch), ‘The Hustle’ still managed to rake in over $65 million worldwide on a budget of $21 million in three weeks, proving that there’s a ready-made audience for bone-headed screwball comedies no matter how much the movie critics hated it.

 

As with Michael Caine and Steve Martin in DRS, ‘The Hustle’ is about two self-styled con-women who are worlds apart and couldn’t be any more different.  Josephine (Hathaway as the analogue to Caine) is a sophisticated cosmopolitan socialite in France who oozes charm and knows how to use all her assets to get what she wants, including setting up elaborate cons to swindle valuables from rich men with the help of a corrupt local policewoman.  Penny (Wilson as the female Steve Martin) is a wannabe hustler who’s new to the trade but is enthusiastic and relentless even as she’s unrefined and clumsy.  When the two unlikely allies scheme to hustle young software entrepreneur Thomas (Alex Sharp), they may have bitten off more than they can hustle.

 

Odd couple comedies usually are safe bets to be funny, but much of the humor in ‘The Hustle’ just isn’t and falls flat.  It isn’t so much that remaking DRS is a bad idea; after all, that movie was well received by the critics.  Rather, ‘The Hustle’ is hampered by a preposterous plot, forced situations that fails to tickle our funny bones and a lack of odd-couple chemistry between the two female leads.  All this doesn’t matter though, because in the end it still managed to hustle nearly $70 million out of us.

Grade: D