Confidence [2003]

Boasting a stellar ensemble cast featuring Academy Award winner Dustin Hoffman, Rachel Weisz (The Mummy), Edward Burns (15 Minutes) and Andy Garcia (Ocean’s Eleven), Confidence is a cool, stylish crime thriller with a remarkable twist. In a double-crossing, scam shocking thriller, Jake Vig and his crew, inside man Gordo, the newly recruited, brash Miles and beautiful pickpocket Lily are about to pull off the biggest con of their careers. The key is confidence, pure confidence.
Bathed in self-conscious cool, Confidence is a heist caper in which the heist is unimportant. As you might expect from Glengarry Glen Ross director James Foley, this pulpy concoction is more interested in giving good actors a lot of hip, salty dialogue as they scheme their way to the royal scam. It’s a poor man’s Ocean’s Eleven, just as enjoyable in its own way, beginning when con artist Jake (Edward Burns) discovers he’s accidentally stolen from an eccentric crime boss (Dustin Hoffman, oozing threat in a fine character turn). Promising to make amends by pulling the biggest con of his career, Jake adds a feisty pickpocket (Rachel Weisz) to his crew, which includes scene-stealer Paul Giammatti and Andy Garcia as a dishevelled FBI agent (or is he?). With a cast like this you can’t go wrong, but Confidence cons itself into thinking it’s original, while Burns’s abundant voice-overs state the obvious and plot twists unfold with minimal surprise. –Jeff Shannon