In the wake of a ‘Joker’, ‘Once Upon A Time in Hollywood’, ‘Ad Astra’ etc. there is ‘Hustlers’.
While in no doubt some of the Hollywood male royalties were delivering some great stuff, ‘Hustlers’ represents what a great female ensemble cast can deliver when being given the right script. Similar to ‘Widows’, ‘Hustlers’ banked in on the society’s negligence of women’s ability to pull off crimes that thought to be a men’s only club.
‘Hustlers’ is not just about strippers, although the premise is within a strip club. It is about a group of women who were being seen at the bottom of the food chain turning things around and put themselves on top. They were daring and entrepreneurial – who could forget about the whole ‘out-sourcing’ speech? But at the same time they were closely knitted. They cared for each other no matter what were the eventual outcomes of their actions.
Jennifer Lopez played the ring leader Ramona who knew the stripper trade back to front and was on top of her game. She took Constance Wu’s Destiny under her wing and trained her into one of her Hurricane duo that torn the wallets and credit cards of their clients apart. They were having a great time and earning great incomes. That is until the Global Financial Crisis hit, and like the Wall Street, they hit rock bottom. In an industry that survives on the money stolen from the unfortunate investors, these girls decided that they would do the justice by stealing from these stealers. The elaborate schemes and daring acts eventually caught notice of the force but all is not the end for the girls themselves.
I personally really like Jennifer Lopez playing these strong female roles taking charge of everything. Her fierceness and her determination demonstrated how Ramona succeeded. Her love for her daughter and will to do anything to keep her daughter in school because ‘she is bright and destined for great things’ showed where her drive to success came from. Ramona’s strong bond with Constance Wu’s Destiny was a bit under-developed in my opinion. For this I mean initially I could not understand what Ramona saw in Destiny that she could develop such strong personal bonds with Destiny, apart from seeing her as the “Triple Threat” (Note: being Asian is one of them). It seems even Destiny was perplexed about it as she mentioned to Julia Stiles’ Elizabeth that ‘Ramona is about business’. But that aside, Ramona though at times crazy was caring, and this care of her brought out Destiny’s inner strength that she didn’t know she had and led them down a path of no return.
‘Hustler’ is a little piece of gem in the spate of male-driven dramas or crime dramas. It is funny yet brutal, especially about how it honestly portrayed the society’s and the strip industry’s view of these women. The themes of ‘you are only worthless if you see yourself as worthless’ and ‘just want to be independent and give life its best’ were flagged repeatedly throughout the several arcs of the story. But what I really like is how they banked in on ‘men won’t tell when they were fooled by women because they see that as weakness and shame’. It was this complex that these women exploited and scored success after success.
‘Hustlers’ is smart yet grounded, chaotic yet well planned. It exhibited a perfect balance in many aspects of film making. Together with the brilliant ensemble cast of Jennifer Lopez, Constance Wu, Julia Stiles, Keke Palmer, Lili Reinhart, and Cardi B, I personally think that this is not a movie to be missed. If people can handle the grittiness of ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’, ‘Hustlers’ just added the glamour to it and elevated its level with a brilliant script, cast and directing. I was pleasantly glad that I stuck to my instincts and gave this film a go. And I think other people should too.
