Review of Matchstick Men

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.