betty dalton Nicholas Cage plays truly one of his best performances of his carreer. One of his last best too, because since the man has gotten several divorces behind him, he nowadays only acts in mediocre movies to pay alimony to his ex wives. But fortunately we can admire Cage in one of his last superb acting roles in "Matchstick Men".Nicholas Cage plays a con man who deprives naive, and vulnerable people of their money with smart con tricks. Besides stealing people's money Cage's character has an obsessive compulsive disorder, which can be described as a mentally disturbing need to obsessively clean his house from dusk till dawn. He lives his life secluded until he finds out he has got a daughter from a previous marriage. Will he quit his criminal con men work to take care of his daughter or will he continue to live a secluded con man life?Ridley Scott is mostly known for his blockbuster action movies. This movie is none of that, on the contrary it is a real clever con men story. And the acting in it is superb. I must confess that I was stunned to read that Ridley Scott directed this movie, because this director only minimally directs his actors, which makes the acting in "Matchstick Men" even more impressive. Smooth, enticing, endearing, funny and suspenseful. But most of all this is truly a very smart story. Often those smart plots are only fun to watch for just one time, but "Matchstick Men" has become a classic con men movie that has stood the test of time. I have watched it over 5 times, know exactly who gets conned by who and I still love it so much. The true to life endearing characters are to thank for that. Great acting. Great story. Con men classic.

classicsoncall I think for most viewers, you'll either like this flick or hate it. I'm still trying to resolve my feeling over the way the con played out against Roy Waller by the time it was all over. That's not to say I'm expressing sympathy for Nicolas Cage's character, he was a serial extortionist and con man who deserved what he got, but I felt huge betrayal on the part of his partner Frank Mercer (Sam Rockwell), and just about as much for the phony 'daughter' Angela (Alison Lohman). You really have to be pathological to do what those two did to Waller, not to mention the psychiatrist Dr. Klein (Bruce Altman). Now that I think about it, maybe he wasn't even a psychiatrist at all, and just another con artist with a good line analyzing Roy Waller. But then the picture took it a step further with a contrived ending in which Waller gets to confront Angela a year later. Like he was really going to go straight and sell carpeting for a living, yeah right. The dynamic between himself and Angela at that point was entirely not credible. So if the intent of the film makers was to con the viewer, I guess it worked, because I felt like I was bilked out of a million dollars myself, not to mention a couple of hours viewing time.

hewlett61 did this illogical mess of a film receive such high reviews? I usually avoid Nicholas Cage movies, but saw this on HBO and I like Sam Rockwell. It was a decent enough movie, a little schmaltzy, but not horrible. That is until the twist, that completely invalidates the first 90 minutes of the movie from having any logic to it at all. The plot is like an extended Rub Goldberg machine, that the protagonist thinks he is in charge of, but EVERYONE ELSE is playing against him, simply for the benefit of his partner. For the whole movie! Can anyone explain how, or why, the characters behaved the way they did when Cage was not in the scene? As they were plotting against him, when they were alone, they remained the characters Cage's character thought they were. If you were conning someone, would you keep the con facade going even when you are alone, or only with other people you are conspiring with? I don't think so. Simply one of the worst plot holes I have ever seen, yet the professional critics, and the other reviews posted here, simply seem to ignore pure cinematic ridiculousness when they see it.

Buster Connolly Considering the idea and plot, the movie was built out well to a very intriguing story of a con man and his business, but within 30 minutes of the film it seemed to get repetitive and predictable. After the 30 minute mark I suspected as to what was going to happen (and getting past all the 'whacky 90's special effects, too.) and it also felt through out the film they only worked on building one characters story and background. The Main character. As in most movies this would be okay, but considerably, he did not have a very important nor exciting back story. Saying that, the movie wasn't too exciting in a whole. It seem to be in pieces, pieces that weren't meant to be there. I am satisfied with the great performances of early Nicolas Cage and Sam Rockwell, and the great directing of Ridley Scott. But for some reason this movie felt more like unbaked dough instead of the whole cake.I give it a 6.