The Hustle (2019)

Penny Rust (Wilson) is a con artist who takes advantage of foolish men.  After narrowly avoiding capture, she decides to scam her way through France.  On the way to a small town in the French Rivera, she meets Josephine Chesterfield (Hathway).  Josephine is a successful, sophisticated con artist.  She has a lavish estate and employees Brigitte (Oliver) and butler Albert (Woodeson) to assist with her schemes).

Penny is impressed, and asks to be trained by Josephine.  She reluctantly agrees and their partnership is born.  However, a few cons later, Penny wants more.  They strike a wager: the first to get $500,000 from wealthy app designer Thomas Westerburg (Sharp), gets to stay on the island and the loser must leave.  With everything on the line, who is the better grifter?


This film is a remake of the 1988 comedy Dirty Rotten Scoundrels starring Michael Caine and Steve Martin, which is a remake of the 1964 film Bedtime Story starring Marlon Brando and David Niven.  This film has the same basic premise as the previous films, but flips the genders of the con artists.

The Good:

The setting is gorgeous.  The island, filmed at Mallorca, and Josephine's home are beautiful.

The Bad:

The film is crass and unnecessary.  And for a comedy, it wasn't very funny.  All of the funniest moments appeared in the trailer.

Other Thoughts:

-This film is disappointing.  It has potential... the bones of the story are good (as evidenced by the success of Bedtime Stories and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels), but the execution failed.

-The filmmakers took the easy joke and embraced the crude... and the end result has a few funny moments, but as a whole, I wasn't impressed.

-Final verdict - skip it.  There are better versions of the same story, and the cast has been better.

The Hustle (2019) 94 minutes
Rating: PG-13 for crude sexual content and language
Director: Chris Addison
Starring: Anne Hathaway as Josephine Chesterfield
Rebel Wilson as Penny Rust
Alex Sharp as Thomas Westerburg
Ingrid Oliver as Brigitte Desjardins
Nicholas Woodeson as Albert