Favorite con artist movie

Paper Moon 

Heh, I like all of the movies mentioned so far, The Sting probably being my favorite of the lot if only because of the players. Paper Moon is also superb; Dirty Rotten Scoundrels is delightful (and I didn’t see the twist coming), and House of Games, while perhaps a weaker Mamet, has that magnificent poker sequence.

Several I could mention, but I’ll just highlight two favorites—Lubitsch’s masterpiece, Trouble in Paradise (1932), and one of Mamet’s best, The Spanish Prisoner (1997). Amusingly, the two form almost a study in contrasts: the first isn’t really about the con, while the latter isn’t really about anything but the con! But they’re both great movies.





I also wonder to what degree other movies would count as “con artist films.” Would The Major and the Minor count? The Game? To Be or Not to Be? There does seem to be a Lubitschean tradition focusing on cons and con-artists that goes in a direct line from the maestro himself to Billy Wilder and thence to David Mamet.

Can't think of anything better than The Sting

" A small-time conman has torn loyalties between his estranged mother and new girlfriend--both of whom are high-stakes grifters with their own angles to play. "

This films has a couple of the most surprising, sudden, shocking scenes that will stick with you for a LONG long time !

Does this count?

My favourite one hasn’t been mentioned yet: Nueve Reinas from Argentina (remade in Hollywood as “Criminal”, with Diego Luna and Maggie Gyllenhaal).

I love “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels” and "A Fish Called Wanda" but I consider them more as comedies than con artist movies.

“The Sting” is of course great. I should watch it again one of these days.

Don’t ask me for specifics because I really can’t remember the details, but my memory of both “Matchstick Men” and “The Spanish Prisoner” is that the stories were too convoluted and that the plan relied on too many convenient decisions by the mark for it to succeed. If at any point the mark had decided to do B instead of A, the whole plan would have fallen apart. In a good, tight con artist plot, the victim does what the conman wants him to do because he has been led to believe that it is the best (or only) thing for him to do, not because it is convenient for the screenwriter.

I enjoyed 'Heartbreakers' (2001).