Hustlers: How to Deal with the Next Financial Crisis

I was really excited to see Hustlers, a movie about a group of female strippers who set up an elaborate scheme to steal money from the rich perverts who frequent their clubs. However, after the day I had at work, where douchey finance bros did their best to derail my projects and belittle my team's efforts, I was even more excited to see their fictional counterparts on screen get their comeuppance. This is a fantastic film that you all should see, but I want to be clear upfront that I had extra special reasons to love it.

Based on the 2015 New York magazine article by Jessica Pressler, the movie tells a true story (though all the names are fictionalized, as well as some of the details - this is Hollywood after all) and it is juicy and phenomenal. Starting out in 2007, Constance Wu plays Destiny, a woman who is stripping to pay the bills and help out her debt-ridden grandmother. She is fascinated by Ramona (Jennifer Lopez, who is fit AF in this movie and delivers a riveting performance), a veteran stripper who knows all the moves and how to navigate the rich clientele of traders and Wall Street CEOs who come through the club's doors. Ramona takes a shine to the struggling Destiny and helps her out with the tricks of the trade. The two are a formidable duo and in 2007, they have a banner year. However, in 2008, Destiny leaves the club to start a family. When she returns in 2011, a single mom and desperate for cash when she can't get hired at any respectable outlet, she is shocked to discover how much things have changed after the financial crisis. No one's spending money, not even the Wall Street bros, and business is sparse. However, Ramona has been hatching some schemes with other women (played by Keke Palmer and Lili Reinhart) to stay afloat in this brave new world and Destiny signs up for the ride.

The scheme involves drugging men in bars, bringing them back to the club, and maxing out their credit cards while they pass out. It's a perfect crime - the men will be too ashamed to call the police to say "I lost thousands of dollars at a strip club!" and as far as Ramona is concerned, these men stole money from the rest of us and caused a global financial crisis, so they can stand to lose some money. This is a movie about women getting their own back from some truly sleazy human beings, so I am all for it. Of course, things go haywire and eventually collapse because these aren't strippers with a heart of gold. Yes, they are targeting assholes, but they get too greedy themselves, and there's plenty of in-fighting, betrayals, and twists and turns because they're still human beings engaged in criminal activity. Ultimately, capitalism and greed is the downfall of everyone involved.

Directed by Lorene Scafaria and featuring an incredible cast of women, this is an engaging and perfect movie about women who are trying to get some agency in pretty grim circumstances. Yes it's set in a strip club, but because it's directed by a woman, the nudity or skimpy getups are not the focus of the story. The strippers are all ages, sizes, and colors, and you genuinely get a sense of what the daily routine of their lives is like and the grubbiness of their jobs, without it being titillating in any way. There's some stunt casting with musicians Cardi B and Lizzo, who are used to excellent comic effect, but are wisely sidelined after the first half of the movie so that trained actresses can take over the more intense drama. And the soundtrack is simply impeccable, featuring thumping, energetic songs that perfectly match the frenetic pace of this film. A sequence set to Britney Spears' "Gimme More" is incredible: what a perfect tune (in general, and for this movie in particular).

Hustlers is a funny, dark, affecting movie. There were moments when I wanted to cry with rage at how these women were being treated and then moments when I wanted to stand up and cheer as they stuck it to the man. I will say that watching this movie in a packed theater is an added bonus because the audience laughed and cheered and booed at all the right moments. We were swept up in this story and were here for these women from the first frame to the last. Of course, this being New York, some enterprising audience member brought their baby to the screening. This kid really started squalling at the end, at which point the woman next to me turned to her friend and said, "Oh, the baby must be seeing all the boobs on screen and getting hungry." So there you have it. Hustlers: it has my hearty endorsement as well as a co-sign from a bebe.