The Long Con... Review on Matchstick Men Movie

Matchstick Men is a great movie about relationships. What you believe to be real and depend upon is not. Things are not what they appear...or are they?

The first relationship is of Roy (Nicholas Cage) and Frank (Sam Rockwell), two simple con men that have been in partnership for years. Both codependent on the other and each covering the other's quirks and shortcomings. Roy is OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) and although quite functional, he is very dependent upon pills, his partner Frank and the controlled environment in which he lives. It is interesting (and funny) to watch Cage as he masters the art of closing doors three times, scrubs his home with every imaginable cleaning solution and smokes like a chimney in a very OCD way.

Frank offers Roy an opportunity at the long con, but Roy is not interested. In this instance, he appears to the be the conservative one that is looking out for Frank.

Next, we meet Roy's estranged daughter, Angela (Alison Lohman) who he is introduced to by his therapist in the course of helping Roy come to terms with his failed marriage. Roy begins to question his own idiosyncracies and developes in a new direction, that of a father who is willing to try new things (new way of eating, shopping, talking). This new relationship is very enlightening to Roy, even though he is still very OCD and he shows Angela how to be a con (at her urging). Little does he know then that she, too, is a con. It seems that he has been set up in a long con all along.

Does, this spoil the movie? Perhaps-But for the ending. This you MUST see. I felt that a bit of this movie was predictable, but the ending was a surprise. I found great value in the three main characters' relationships and found great depth upon reflection after the movie and seeing it several times.