The Grifters

It's interesting to note that The Grifters, released in 1990, was the first film for Stephen Frears following Dangerous Liaisons. The settings couldn't be more different--eighteenth century France or modern day Los Angeles, but both had an underlying sense of betrayal and cruelty.

A twisted love triangle, The Grifters centerd around three characters: Roy (John Cusack) a small-time con man who has a fortune stashed behind one of his clown paintings; his girlfriend, Myra Langtry (Annette Bening, in her star-making role), who is a veteran of long cons and wants to make Cusack her partner, and Anjelica Huston as Cusack's mother, who works for a bookie, going to racetracks and making large bets to bring the odds on long-shots down.

Huston travels to Los Angeles and sees Cusack for the first time in eight years. She disapproves of Bening, and throughout the film there is a touch of the Oedipal, as Huston was only fourteen when she gave birth and Cusack calls her by her first name, Lilly. Bening, annoyed that Huston is fouling up her plans, rats her out to her boss, with some nasty consequences. Two of these characters will end up dead.

I love confidence man pictures, and The Grifters, while based on a somber pulp novel by Jim Thompson, adapted by Donald E. Westlake, who has written some great pulp novels of is own, is sadistic fun. At times the pacing is off--movies like these need to be as tight as a snare drum--and at times the dialogue edges into self-parody.

But the performances keep it aloft. Huston was nominated for an Oscar, as was Bening, who plays a femme fatale who will sell her body to stay out of a tight spot. She has a couple of nude scenes that will keep the boys at Celebrity Skin happy. Cusack, to me, is an actor who has never quite lived up to his potential. Feel free to discuss. Great old character actors J.T. Walsh and Henry Jones liven things up.

The music, by Elmer Bernstein, is chilling and brooding, matching the overall tone of the movie, which is don't trust anybody. Pat Hingle makes a brief and memorable cameo as Huston's boss, and when she can't get to the track in time and a 70-to-1 longshot comes in, Hingle explains that beating someone with a towel full of oranges can lead to permanent internal injuries. But he's just bluffing--instead he burns his cigar into the back of her hand (that will be an important moment in the film, it turns out).

You may want to take a shower after seeing The Grifters, which defies the rule that there have to likable characters--these characters aren't sympathetic, they are just driven by the need for survival (interesting side note--The Asphalt Jungle, a heist movie that also has no sympathetic characters, was directed by Anjelica's father, John, who in an introduction says that despite their not being anybody to root for, he hopes that the film is still fascinating). It's the dark underbelly of a movie like The Sting. But I think it's a worthy film, if not a perfect one.