David O. Russell's American Hustle

[Wolfwood]

The ice fishing story was so damn funny, the way that joke kept building throughout the film had me nearly snorting. Louis CK was awesome in this movie.

 

[Team Andino]

I absolutely loved this, I can't wait to go again. Could possibly be one of my favorite movies ever.

 

[JackWhite]

Finally saw this. Oh man was it funny. I'm really thinking this is O'Russell's best work yet.

 

[Rocketman]

I loved every performance in this film, and I think it's possibly Bale's best acting ever. Cooper was amazing, the music was amazing, and the writing/story was top notch.

However... Man, I wish someone else had directed this. Russell's choices as far as camera movement, angles and editing were just abysmal. This was a phenomenal ensemble piece that was ruined by sloppy editing and amateur directing. And if that was on purpose, I don't care. Shame on you for purposely making a poorly made film.

And the sad irony is that Russell's job as a director is to get the performances he got, and for that, he's a great "acting director", but he presented it in a piss-poor way and ultimately looks like a really bad "movie director".

Just my opinion. I was incredibly frustrated by the whole experience.

Acting: 10/10
Directing/Editing: 2/10

 

[Hurm...]

I loved every performance in this film, and I think it's possibly Bale's best acting ever. Cooper was amazing, the music was amazing, and the writing/story was top notch.

However... Man, I wish someone else had directed this. Russell's choices as far as camera movement, angles and editing were just abysmal. This was a phenomenal ensemble piece that was ruined by sloppy editing and amateur directing. And if that was on purpose, I don't care. Shame on you for purposely making a poorly made film.

And the sad irony is that Russell's job as a director is to get the performances he got, and for that, he's a great "acting director", but he presented it in a piss-poor way and ultimately looks like a really bad "movie director".

Just my opinion. I was incredibly frustrated by the whole experience.

Acting: 10/10
Directing/Editing: 2/10

Exactly. And while I disagree with you that this is one of Bale's best performances, and the acting was GOOD, not amazing IMO. Also, I disagree with you about the story's quality. I 100% agree with you on O. Russell. That is why I find all of his movies so difficult to watch. The poor direction usually overwhelms the GOOD performances. "Frustrating" is how I described my viewing experience to my friends and family too.

 

[jacobed]

Which is a shame because he gets such great performances out of his actors. This is easily my favorite of the year

 

[Doctor Jones]

Exactly. And while I disagree with you that this is one of Bale's best performances, and the acting was GOOD, not amazing IMO. Also, I disagree with you about the story's quality. I 100% agree with you on O. Russell. That is why I find all of his movies so difficult to watch. The poor direction usually overwhelms the GOOD performances. "Frustrating" is how I described my viewing experience to my friends and family too.

You know, I think it's because a lot was cut from this. I'd totally give this another chance if I could see a longer cut. Maybe then we can see everything stretch its legs a bit more.

 

[Wolfwood]

The only thing that bothered me were the constant panning up or down shots of certain characters. There was one shot that fixated on Amy Adam's ass, which was also a bit jarring.

 

[flickchick85]

The only thing that bothered me were the constant panning up or down shots of certain characters. There was one shot that fixated on Amy Adam's ass, which was also a bit jarring.

I think I know what shot you're talking about, and if you go see it again as I did, you'll see that her ass was sort of the "red herring" of the shot, and that the true subject of the shot was her purse with the embedded microphone.

 

[Fallen Angel]

That should not be a complaint guys. you should be thanking David O Russell.t:

 

[kvz5]

I'm more intrigued with the extended shots of the hands. There were times when the camera would just pan to the hands of the characters. It's starting to be a trend lately. I was watching The Dark Knight Rises again yesterday and I remembered noticing before how many times the camera would pan to the feet (Bruce's in particular).

 

[Rocketman]

The biggest offense was the scene with DeNiro. Here was a chance to see Robert DeNiro and Christian Bale together for the first time, two acting legends of their generations, and they don't even share the same frame together. How is that even possible? Such a wasted opportunity.

What was even worse was the head-scratching decision to cut to a zoom-in of their faces within its same shot. In other words, the shot cuts to itself only zoomed in. That's like an Editing 101 No-No. It looks incredibly amateur, and the zoom in shows a lot of digital noise because it wasn't meant to be filmed that way. And I know exactly why it was done. It was because they had a good take of a line from DeNiro, followed by a bad take of the next line, so they cut to the good take of that line and spliced it into itself to make it look like one coherent reading of two lines... but it zooms in to itself to hide that. It wasn't hidden very well, because I was onto it as soon as it happened. That scene alone proves that Russell is an incredibly bad director. Not a single second of his work was Oscar worthy here.

^ And I HATE the inevitable excuse that "that was the style of the film." I don't care if it's his "style". That was NOT done on purpose. Making mistakes and trying to clean them up cleverly in editing is not a style. It's a sign that he didn't have complete control of his film. He was winging it, and it's sloppy.

 

[DACrowe]

You should never watch Goodfellas then. Or really any Scorsese picture from the 1990s. That man loved playing fast and loose with continuity, composition and any other rule you might have guessed during that period.

 

[Wolfwood]

I think I know what shot you're talking about, and if you go see it again as I did, you'll see that her ass was sort of the "red herring" of the shot, and that the true subject of the shot was her purse with the embedded microphone.

Ah that's right. Yeah, I will definitely be watching this film again.

 

[flickchick85]

You should never watch Goodfellas then. Or really any Scorsese picture from the 1990s. That man loved playing fast and loose with continuity, composition and any other rule you might have guessed during that period.

Yeah, once directors reach a certain point, they tend to just throw the "rules" of filmmaking that we all learned in film school out the window. Russell has been one of those guys for a while now.

 

[samsnee]

I guess I'm in the minority. I thought it was interesting, but was disappointed. I found Silver Linings Playbook to be more comedic. Bale was uninteresting in this. His character was just soft whispers with no real charisma one would expect from someone who is a con man. Jennifer Lawrence was just loud and obnoxious. The only performances I enjoyed were Amy Adams's and Jeremy Renner's.

Once the scam was put into place, it picked up, but took way too long to get there. I've enjoyed most of Russell's other works, but this was a letdown.

 

[Fallen Angel]

I'm going to see this tomorrow can't wait. It's been getting pretty great reviews and my friend saw it last week thought it was brilliant his favorite film of the year.

 

[MrMaooz]

I liked the movie, but I didn't think it was great, Great performances all around. Some scenes were hilarious too. I see Pena getting no love but he had me rolling. Louis was great too. And damn, Amy was super hot. Overall, I just thought it got a little boring at times and some things just didn't click for me.

7/10

 

[MrMaooz]

Am I the only one who thinks Bradley Cooper sounds like he has a cold all the time?

 

[kedrell]

Ok, just saw it. On the poll I put it at a 6 but it's really more like a 5.5/10 for me.

Not all that good and this type of film is usually right in my wheel house. The first half is the worst of it with only Jeremy Renner's mayor Carmine Polito as the lone stand out. Then DeNiro shows up halfway through and the movie doesn't really go from a bad movie to a good one but more like it goes from a bad movie to an ok one from there on out. Like everybody started caring a little bit more after that. Still, it really makes you appreciate guys like Scorsese when they make these kinds of period crime films just pop with interesting stuff. This film seems like a weak sauce imitation of those ones. I'm right on the cusp with this one whether I give it a 5.5 or a 6 out of 10 but since I hadn't even addressed the disappointment issue with it that ended up tipping the scales further in the negative for the 5.5/10. With this cast/crew behind it this should have been a much better film. Kinda disappointing, ultimately.

 

[Hush]

I just saw this last year and I thought it was pretty damn good, not wolf on wall street good but damn good. Much better performance movie than a movie as a whole. Russell needs to listen to a cinematographer once in a while because his cuts and edits hurt films more times than help. I enjoyed the film and would give it a 9 because the performances overweighted some crappy editing.

 

[weezerspider]

Yeah, once directors reach a certain point, they tend to just throw the "rules" of filmmaking that we all learned in film school out the window. Russell has been one of those guys for a while now.

Yeah, Scorsese's films are littered with awful continuity editing, Kubrick crossed the line and broke the 180-degree all the time, and Scorsese has often thrown the 'show don't tell' concept out of the window, and relied heavily on narration in several of his most famous films. Rules are meant to be broken. It's art. Art has no rules.

I loved the cinematography and editing in this film. I hate how so many films nowadays are simply shot for coverage. The director gets a shot from every possible direction of the scene and then pieces it together in the editing room instead of having a true vision: shooting longer lasting shots, that rely on camera movement instead of simply cutting, actually using the beautiful 2-shot that is all but extinct nowadays, and shooting only what you know you are going to use. Alfred Hitchcock's long-time editor, George Tomasini, used to joke that his job was simply cutting the slates off, stating Hitchcock shot exactly what he wanted and knew exactly how it was going to come together. That's real vision, not a jigsaw puzzle. So many films these days have so many quick cuts and feel like they were really created in the editing room. That's fine, and there is always going to certain sequences in a film that are best discovered that way, but creating a whole film like that is just not my preference and American Hustle didn't seem to be made a jigsawy.

 

[Fallen Angel]

So I went to see this today and thought it was great a really fun movie.

Amy Adams and Christan Bale were fantastic they were the stand outs the rest of the main cast were all pretty good. Jennifer Lawrence her screen time in it and the promotion of her in the movie a big diffrence but it's undertsntable with Catching Fire being released a a few weeks back.

Amy Adams and Jennifer Lawrence looked amazing and Amy does a very good English accent.

You know one thing I wasn't happy about Bradley Coopers character wouldn't let his captain finish the ice fishing story. He interrupted him on I think 4 separate occasions. I was like "man stop interrupting him and let him finish his damn story". t:

It's a 9/10 and in my top 3 movies of 2013 still doesn't beat Rush for me.

 

[BestGirl]

Lawrence was hilarious in this film but I still consider her to be miscast. This role felt like it was made for someone twice her age.

Also, I didn't get how Cooper's character [BLACKOUT]was able to beat up his boss and not get fired or sent to jail immediately. That whole scene felt like it dropped in right out of the blue.[/BLACKOUT]

It was ballsy of Russell to make a movie about mostly unlikable characters. And the most likable of the bunch, Carmine Polito, [BLACKOUT]is the only one to go to prison in the end. I kept waiting for him to be outed as a greedy scumbag or get saved and was shocked when neither happened.[/BLACKOUT]

The De Niro scene was the tensest I've been watching a movie in a while.

Overall, American Hustle was really entertaining. I enjoyed it.

 

[Vengeance of Bane]

Even though I hate spinoffs, I would love to see a film with De Niro's character. That flashback scenes was awesome, and it was very reminiscent of "the old" De Niro we all love.