In the midst of veteran con man Nicky's latest scheme, a woman from his past - now an accomplished femme fatale - shows up and throws his plans for a loop.
While helping his latest client woo the fine lady of his dreams, a professional "date doctor" finds that his game doesn't quite work on the gossip columnist with whom he's smitten.
Years after a plague kills most of humanity and transforms the rest into monsters, the sole survivor in New York City struggles valiantly to find a cure.
In Pittsburgh, accomplished pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu uncovers the truth about brain damage in football players who suffer repeated concussions in the course of normal play.
Retreating from life after a tragedy, a man questions the universe by writing to Love, Time and Death. Receiving unexpected answers, he begins to see how these things interlock and how even loss can reveal moments of meaning and beauty.
Hancock is a superhero whose ill considered behavior regularly causes damage in the millions. He changes when the person he saves helps him improve his public image.
Two hip detectives protect a witness to a murder while investigating a case of stolen heroin from the evidence storage room from their police precinct.
An F.B.I. Agent and an Interpol Detective track a team of illusionists who pull off bank heists during their performances, and reward their audiences with the money.
Nicky Spurgeon is an extremely accomplished con man who takes an amateur con artist, Jess, under his wing. Nicky and Jess become romantically involved, and with Nicky's profession of being a liar and a cheater for a living, he realizes that deception and love are things that don't go together. They split, only to see each other three years later... And things get messy.
The sly joke about Australians made by Nicky, in relation to McEwan being an Australian, is an in-joke originally suggested by Margot Robbie to reference the fact that Robert Taylor and she are Australian, and is a gimmick Margot likes to have in her projects, to give her friends and family in Australia a bit of a laugh. See more »
Goofs
During his explanation of the scam that took place during the Super Bowl game, Nicky comments that because the song "Sympathy for the Devil" has 124 "woo woos" and the Mandarin word for five is "wu" that the number 5 was being subconsciously planted in their mark Liyuan's head to help him pick the number 55, however the song doesn't start playing until after Liyuan picks a player, it only starts playing later when Jess looks through the binoculars and tries to pick the same player...so that would have done nothing to influence Liyuan's picking 55. See more »
Quotes
Nicky:
You see, there's a science to getting people to trust you. With women, it's all about emotion. Connection. That you feel the emotion as strongly as they do. They've been dreaming about that shit ever since they were little girls.
Nicky:
With her it was shared history. A friendly face. Set her off balance. Helps diffuse aggression. Start discussing emotional shit. They're disarmed. Now they're open. You know you got 'em when they start to unconsciously mimic you. A head nod. A hand gesture. It means ...
[...] See more »
La Espada De Cadorna
Written and Performed by Mauro Alberelli, Fernando Diego Barreyro, María Carla Flores, Fermín Echeveste, Manuel González Aguilar, Mateo González Aguilar and Carlos Maximiliano Russo See more »
Those that had to get Fifty Shades of Grey out of their system did so on opening weekend. Those who were curious did so the following weekend. Those that are going this weekend are probably just going to be drunks and guys who wear trench coats a lot (even in summer). We need a new adult romance now and Focus fits the bill, and also puts way more of an emphasis on the word "adult". It's also a return to form for Will Smith, looking for a boost after that After Earth debacle in 2013. He's still every bit the playa we want him to be in a movie directed by Glenn Ficcara and John Requa (Crazy, Stupid, Love) that has a stylish sexiness in almost every scene.
Smith plays Nicky, the kind of confident, well dressed mystery man who doesn't seem to mind eating at a fancy restaurant alone. He's approached by Jess (Margot Robbie), they get to talking, and soon they're both going back to his hotel room. It's a con but Jess is an amateur, leading to a scene of sly humor that Smith plays to perfection. But Jess wants to learn how to "dance in the dark" as Nicky puts it and so after learning a few tricks from him, she follows him to New Orleans where she finds herself a member of his team of pickpockets. Through sleight of hands and various scams, Nicky has a whole network of people focusing on gambling, credit card fraud, tricking adulterous married dudes and more. They clean up, which is part of the fun.
This movie is all about being smooth and it revels in that almost as much as it does in the beauty of its two stars and the vibrancy of the place they're in. New Orleans, from Mardi Gras to a casino to the Superdome, supplies a perfect backdrop as these two get frisky and flirty with each other. They have great chemistry, it's sexy but shows just the right amount of restraint for two people who are into each other but can't risk distraction in their line of work. By far the best scene in the movie though comes when Nick bets with an Asian businessman (an excellent B.D. Wong) during a football game. It's crazy just how out of control it gets and it ends awesomely.
The movie can only go downhill from a scene as audacious as this and it does. Nicky and Jess suddenly go separate ways only to reunite three years later in Argentina where Nicky is helping out a grand prix owner (Rodrigo Santoro) that Jess just happens to be dating. Do these two share real feelings or is one or both just playing the other? Who knows, but we're pretty sure that Ficarra and Requa lose the playful spark between these two in Argentina and there's an ending plot twist that I'm not sure really works. Gerald McRaney has a few good scenes as a hard-ass, suspicious bodyguard here but it's Smith, playing a guy with a gift of gab, and Robbie, a beauty with not just a great smile but also poise, charm, and humor, who keep Focus afloat even when the movie doesn't seem quite sure of itself.
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Those that had to get Fifty Shades of Grey out of their system did so on opening weekend. Those who were curious did so the following weekend. Those that are going this weekend are probably just going to be drunks and guys who wear trench coats a lot (even in summer). We need a new adult romance now and Focus fits the bill, and also puts way more of an emphasis on the word "adult". It's also a return to form for Will Smith, looking for a boost after that After Earth debacle in 2013. He's still every bit the playa we want him to be in a movie directed by Glenn Ficcara and John Requa (Crazy, Stupid, Love) that has a stylish sexiness in almost every scene.
Smith plays Nicky, the kind of confident, well dressed mystery man who doesn't seem to mind eating at a fancy restaurant alone. He's approached by Jess (Margot Robbie), they get to talking, and soon they're both going back to his hotel room. It's a con but Jess is an amateur, leading to a scene of sly humor that Smith plays to perfection. But Jess wants to learn how to "dance in the dark" as Nicky puts it and so after learning a few tricks from him, she follows him to New Orleans where she finds herself a member of his team of pickpockets. Through sleight of hands and various scams, Nicky has a whole network of people focusing on gambling, credit card fraud, tricking adulterous married dudes and more. They clean up, which is part of the fun.
This movie is all about being smooth and it revels in that almost as much as it does in the beauty of its two stars and the vibrancy of the place they're in. New Orleans, from Mardi Gras to a casino to the Superdome, supplies a perfect backdrop as these two get frisky and flirty with each other. They have great chemistry, it's sexy but shows just the right amount of restraint for two people who are into each other but can't risk distraction in their line of work. By far the best scene in the movie though comes when Nick bets with an Asian businessman (an excellent B.D. Wong) during a football game. It's crazy just how out of control it gets and it ends awesomely.
The movie can only go downhill from a scene as audacious as this and it does. Nicky and Jess suddenly go separate ways only to reunite three years later in Argentina where Nicky is helping out a grand prix owner (Rodrigo Santoro) that Jess just happens to be dating. Do these two share real feelings or is one or both just playing the other? Who knows, but we're pretty sure that Ficarra and Requa lose the playful spark between these two in Argentina and there's an ending plot twist that I'm not sure really works. Gerald McRaney has a few good scenes as a hard-ass, suspicious bodyguard here but it's Smith, playing a guy with a gift of gab, and Robbie, a beauty with not just a great smile but also poise, charm, and humor, who keep Focus afloat even when the movie doesn't seem quite sure of itself.