Sharper review – classy cast lead delectable caper about fraudsters and the super-rich - The Guardian

Screenwriters Brian Gatewood and Alessandro Tanaka have had big successes in the world of comedy and satire: now they have crafted this delectably enjoyable caper about fraudsters and Manhattan’s super-rich, a little like something by David Mamet – though without reaching the Mametian hard concrete floor of cynicism – or maybe Stephen Frears’s sleazy drama The Grifters, based on the novel by Jim Thompson.

British TV director Benjamin Caron makes a surefooted feature debut here, and his experience on programmes by illusionist Derren Brown may have qualified him for this.

Gentle bibliophile Tom (Justice Smith), sits behind the counter reading Edgar Allan Poe, and looks up alertly when a (rare) customer comes in: this is the stylish twentysomething Sandra (Briana Middleton) who is after something by Zora Neale Hurston.

A terrible crisis brings the two lovers into traumatic contact with sinuous, predatory city slicker Max (Sebastian Stan), wealthy New York socialite Madeline (Julianne Moore) and her mega-rich husband Richard (John Lithgow).

Stan is a smooth rodent of charlatanism; Middleton is a charmer; Lithgow has the wary poise of the fabulously wealthy and Smith is naturally a darker horse than you think.

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