Perhaps a companion piece to American Hustle is this semi-historical loopy conspiracy opus with plenty of moving parts in the story line and characters connected to the 1933 Business Plot.
David O. Russell doesn’t have the film’s sinewy sophistication around ‘Abscan’, but plenty of an enjoyably amusing incident around such scandalous derring-do surrounding a doctor (Christian Bale), his lawyer friend (John David Washington), and a vivacious nurse (Margot Robbie). The lighter tone and quirky approach inclUdes slapstick action and screwball romance, but emerges in sprawling, meandering form with its share of racial and political tensions.
A delightfully polished production filled with much dedication to the pinwheeling filmmaking ambitiousness is belied by an overloaded mystery in spite of appealing turns by leads, especially Bale in a nod to Peter Falk, and an impressive ensemble some making better impressions than others, like Michael Shannon, Mike Myers, and a stentorian Robert DeNiro.