American Hustle: The Strange Effects of Bradley Cooper

Does anyone else have this problem? Lately it seems like whenever I watch a film starring Bradley Cooper it feels like time passes much more slowly. I first noticed it during The Place Beyond the Pines and just put it down to the film being badly in need of a good editor. After all the film spans multiple years, characters and generation and it would only take a little tweaking to the story a more fluid feel and spare my legs the DVT.

American Hustle however follows the same ensemble through events that spanned a few years yet somehow feels longer than the time Solomon Northup spent picking cotton. Partially because all notion of progression over time is lost in a series of non sequitar scenes with seemingly no bearing on the bigger picture. The actual mechanics of the Abscam Scandal, on which the film is based is lost among petty confrontations as the main players try to out-annoy each other. It's like Ocean's Eleven if you replaced all the exposition and heist planning with George Clooney and Brad Pitt engaged in a series of slap fights. Entertaining yes, but it robs the film of drama.

The film can't seem to make its mind up on what it wants to achieve from act one. As Cooper's FBI Agent Richie DiMaso rumbles con artists Irving Rosenfield (Christian Bale) and Sydney Prosser/Edith Greensley (Amy Adams, donning a variety of ostentatious accents) he blackmails them into lining up four additional arrests. Then it's just altruistic politician Carmine Polito, then it's a prominent mob boss, then it's ten congressmen, which point it needs a really elaborate con to arrest my interest.

The film is so bloated and unstructured that it ends up pushing potentially interesting story elements to the margins. Irving's doomed friendship with Carmine and Jennifer Lawrence's standout performance as his oblivious wife barely get a look in. Particularly egregious when you consider how much Lawrence has featured in the films marketing relative to her actual screen time.

Lawrence's role, both in characterisation and accent, is practically a microcosm of the films goofy tone and over-the-top aesthetics. Big hair, low-cut dresses and valour suits. All of which work for a consistently comedic tone which the film carries for the majority of its run...right up until it doesn't. Suddenly the film takes a really dark turn, the kind the Coen Brothers could make work but comes out of left-field in director David O. Russell's hands.

It isn't helped by coming around the fifth act when you're already hoping for an ending. Nor the fact that the culprit is DiMaso, the petulant, perpetually dissatisfied perm-job who's been begging for slap the entire film. And while his actions make sense in terms of his character the fact that everyone keeps working with him adds a grim air to subsequent scenes.

American Hustle's worst crime is simply not knowing what it wants to be. An outlandish premise and thoroughly game cast are the ingredients for a fun, campy crime caper. But the total absence of pace, tension and context makes the film little more than disposable fun. Then ruins the fun in its determination to emulate Goodfellas. In fact at one point a cameo from a Goodfellas star elevates the films entire mood and quality into something truly nail biting. As though Scorsese is sending a cinematic messenger to Russell saying 'You think you're ready to take the reins, you ain't ready to take 'em an I ain't givin' 'em up.'