American Hustle was a very pleasant surprise. Usually these “big” movies, with their big, bloated stars and their huge advertising budgets, turn out to be bitter disappointments. But not in this case; American Hustle turned out to be better than I was expecting, better even than I was hoping. I’m not sure I’m quite ready to call it a great film – we’ll have to see if it maintains its interest and freshness on re-watching. But I suspect that it will. It’s a cool, unusual, entertaining film, well worth seeing.

American Hustle is definitely not a completely serious movie. The plots of the various hustles are certainly not airtight or spelled out in a lot of satisfying detail. And although the film is quite funny, I’m not sure I’d call it a comedy either. It struck me as a kind of magnificent 1970s fairytale, almost dream-like in quality. The camerawork and cinematography are superb; the film has a gorgeous color palate, captures settings beautifully, and all the actors look simply fabulous on screen. The wardrobes blend nearly every sartorial aspect of that decade, in ways that are not quite realistic, but its done so consistently, and the characters are so strongly inhabited by their actors, that their appearance just becomes one more integrated aspect of a coherent and effective visual scheme.

The film also features a well-chosen soundtrack of fabulous 70s music. It is definitely guilty of riding its soundtrack, but instead of using this as a crutch, it manages to do it in a way that adds something tangible to the film; it reminded me of Breaking The Waves in that the soundtrack exploitation is done via musical interludes, rest periods between the action, the only difference being that Hustle uses montages in the interludes, rather than static shots. This technique amplified the pleasant dreamlike quality of the film.

But what puts American Hustle over the top is the gorgeous visuals and fab music supports a film grounded in interesting and well-conceived characters that are cast extremely well, within a fun and entertaining story. The two main characters (Christian Bale, Amy Adams) are wonderful: they are quirky and odd, but delightfully human, and you bond with them quickly and firmly. In a lighthearted way they embody certain themes concerning human attraction and human fallibility. Bale and Adams have terrific chemistry together, and Bale in particular gives an amazingly natural performance.

The other main characters are also wonderful, if not quite as striking as the two leads. Jeremy Renner brings tremendous warmth and realism to the character of the Mayor, and Bradley Cooper brings his usual frenetic energy and great voice to the role of the ambitious FBI agent. The one partial exception (and my wife disagreed with me on this) was Jennifer Lawrence. It’s not that she was bad, she was okay; she blended into the ensemble fairly well (she was very well-directed, like the rest of them,) and even managed to not seem like her usual, wooden self at least 50% of the time. But she did not inhabit her character to the masterful degree that the others did; every time she was on screen, I kept thinking “and there’s Jennifer Lawrence, playing a well-written character,” whereas the others disappeared into their roles much more thoroughly. But the Academy will probably give her another Oscar for this performance, so what do I know?!

As I said in the opening, I’m not sure how American Hustle will age. It rides narration in the beginning, and some of the more disjointed scenes of humorous dialog might not age very well. I’m not totally sure the story is interesting enough to truly stand the test of time. But any film with characters this compelling, and an aesthetic concept this pleasing and well-realized is certainly a significant film, and I know I’ll be returning to watch it at least one more time in the future. My wife and I have already discussed adding it to the collection, so clearly it struck a chord!

I highly recommend American Hustle. It’s one hyped movie that really does not disappoint.