“Hustlers” Share Money from the Wolves

Release Date：Sep/13/2019
Genre：Comedy/Crime/Drama
Director：Lorene Scafaria
Cast：Jennifer Lopez、Constance Wu、Julia Stiles、Cardi B、Julia Stiles、Keke Palmer

Viola's Rating：7.7







Right after Christmas, an article called “The Hustlers at Scores” appeared in the Dec. 28th 2015 issue of New York magazine, which is about a scheme of a group of exotic dancers or strippers stealing money by drugging Wall Street workers. Now that the story has been adapted into a feature film, and is critically acclaimed, “Hustlers” has its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, and was released on Sep. 13^th, 2019.

There are two meanings of “Hustler”, one is a prostitute, and the other is someone who tries to trick people into giving them money. Although the main characters don’t do prostitution, their profession is related to sex in general, it’s easy for them to be stigmatized. Inspired by the viral New York Magazine article, “Hustlers” follows a crew of savvy former strip club employees who band together to turn the tables on their Wall Street clients.

Not only depicting what really happened, “Hustlers” also utilized the strip club elements to make the film more appealing while not making the audience feel that female characters are objectified because the flick itself is still female dominated. In order to fulfill this purpose, a bunch of A-list stars were casted such as Constance Wu (“Crazy Rich Asians”), Jennifer Lopez and Cardi B, who was even once an exotic dancer herself. With their amazing acting skill, this dramatic, criminal comedy is even more interesting.


As mentioned before, “Hustlers” is a deeply feminist motion picture, so although the theme is related to strippers, it won’t make female audience uncomfortable. Instead, it prizes how women fight for themselves, claw their ways up and be dependent without men’s help, well, literally they still do. Of course, there are people in the industry who break the law and provide sex service, but the protagonists strongly disagree with the idea. What they do is still a scheme, so not that they’re not breaking the law, but at least they have their dignity and principle being women.

Besides talking about women in general, “Hustlers” specifically emphasizes on “being a mom”. J-Lo’s character says that moms are crazy, indicating that they’re all willing to sacrifice more for their children, which is the most sacred love in the world.

Thinking “Hustlers” as the exotic dancer version of “The Oceans”, the movie not only presents the detailed procedure main characters steal money from clients, but also clarifies what kind of clients they target. Only those who are rich but they’re not supposed to and those who are married but still go to the strip club are targeted.

Maybe the ambiance of “Hustlers” isn’t your cup of tea; you can still enjoy this unbelievable true story by experiencing the precious sisterhood the protagonists share with each other. After all, their victims are wolves of the Wall Street.

Picture Credit: IMDb