Confidence trick (tv and movies)

Fictional portrayals

Movies and television

• The Lady Eve (1941) – directed by Preston Sturges; the main character, Jean Harrington (Barbara Stanwyck), is a con artist.

1950s

• Racket Squad (1951–1953) – TV series in the style of Dragnet with all episodes focused on confidence crimes.
• The Rainmaker (1956) – directed by Joseph Anthony; the main character, Bill Starbuck (Burt Lancaster), is a con artist.
• Witness for the Prosecution (1957) — directed by Billy Wilder

1960s

• The Music Man (1962) — produced and directed by Morton DaCosta; the main character, Harold Hill (Robert Preston), is a con artist.
• Mission: Impossible (1966–73 TV series) – the IMF team's adventures usually take the form of an elaborate con game in which the villain is the mark. Series writer William Read Woodfield was a self-professed confidence enthusiast and had read David Maurer's books on the subject.
• The Flim-Flam Man (1967) — directed by Irvin Kershner; the main character, Mordecai Jones (George C. Scott), is a con artist.
• The Producers (1968) – written and directed by Mel Brooks; the main characters, Max Bialystock (Zero Mostel) and Leopold Bloom (Gene Wilder), are con artists.

1970s

• Midnight Cowboy — directed by John Schlesinger; the main character, Ratso Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman) is a small-time con artist.
• Skin Game (1971) – directed by Paul Bogart; the main characters, Quincy Drew (James Garner) and Jason O'Rourke (Louis Gossett Jr.), con people.
• The Sting (1973) – directed by George Roy Hill; two professional grifters, Johnny Hooker (Robert Redford) and Henry Gondorff (Paul Newman) try to con a mob boss

1980s

• The A-Team (1983–1986, TV) — created by Frank Lupo and Stephen J. Cannell; con tricks are performed mostly by team member Tempelton Peck (played by Dirk Benedict)
• House of Games (1987) – directed by David Mamet; features con artists as main characters
• The Vanishing (1988) – directed by George Sluizer; directed by Frank Oz the main character is a victim of a confidence trick; a remake was released in 1993
• Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988) – directed by Frank Oz; main characters, Freddy Benson (Steve Martin) and Lawrence Jamieson (Michael Caine), are con artists

1990s

• The Grifters (1990) – directed by Stephen Frears; the story of Lilly Dillon (Anjelica Huston), a con artist
• Diggstown (1992) – directed by Michael Ritchie; the main character, Gabriel Caine (James Woods), is a con man
• Six Degrees of Separation (1993) – directed by Fred Schepisi; the plot was inspired by the real-life story of David Hampton, a con man
• The Usual Suspects (1995) – directed by Bryan Singer; one of the characters is a con man
• Traveller (1997) – Bokky (Bill Paxton) is a confidence man
• The Spanish Prisoner (1997) – directed by David Mamet; named after the confidence game "Spanish Prisoner"
• The Pest (1997 film) — Pestario 'Pest' Vargas (John Leguizamo) is a Latino con man
• The Talented Mr. Ripley (film) (1999) - directed by Anthony Minghella; Tom Ripley (Matt Damon) is a con artist.
• Ed, Edd, n Eddy (1999) - three main characters spend their time scamming other kids to get money in order to buy jawbreakers

2000s

• Boiler Room (2000) – directed by Ben Younger. Giovanni Ribisi plays entry-level investment broker working in a boiler room operation as part of a microcap stock fraud, with Ben Affleck and Vin Diesel.
• Nine Queens (Nueve Reinas) (2000) – directed by Fabián Bielinsky; tells the story of two con artists who meet by chance and decide to cooperate in a scam; remade as Criminal (2004)
• The Prime Gig (2000) – directed by Gregory Mosher; Pendelton "Penny" Wise (Vince Vaughn) is a con artist
• Birthday Girl (2001) – directed by Jez Butterworth; the main character, John Buckingham (Ben Chaplin), is a victim of a scam based on the con
• Heist (2001) — directed by David Mamet; the plot is based on a confidence game
• Heartbreakers (2001) – directed by David Mirkin; Max (mother) and Page Conners (daughter) con women
• Ocean's Eleven (2001) (remake of the 1960 film by Lewis Milestone) and sequels Ocean's Twelve (2004) and Ocean's Thirteen (2007) – directed by Steven Soderbergh; films about con artists and the con
• The Score (2001) — directed by Frank Oz; the main characters try to con one another
• Catch Me If You Can (2002) — directed by Steven Spielberg; story about a real-life con artist and impostor Frank Abagnale
• Confidence (2003) – directed by James Foley; a group of con artists attempt to rip off a corrupt bank president
• Matchstick Men (2003) – directed by Ridley Scott; the main characters are con artists
• Shade (2003) – directed by Damian Nieman; story about poker hustlers who try to con other players
• Hustle (2004 – present) — a BBC series about a team of con artists
• Criminal (2004) — directed by Gregory Jacobs; about a team of con artists
• Lost (2004), TV series, two characters, James "Sawyer" Ford and Anthony Cooper, are both con-artists.
• Going Postal (2004), a Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett, features the semi-ex confidence artist Moist Von Lipwig as the protagonist, as does its 2007 sequel, Making Money.
• A Con (2005) — created by a con artist Skyler Stone, who reveals the secrets of his profession by performing confidence tricks, scams, and hoaxes
• Revolver (2005) — directed by Guy Ritchie; one of the main characters, Jake Green (Jason Statham), is a con artist, and the premise of the film is a con
• Bluffmaster (2005) — directed by Rohan Sippy; the main character, Roy, is a professional conman
• Colour Me Kubrick (2006) – directed by Brian W. Cook; based on a true story of Alan Conway, who posed as director Stanley Kubrick
• Lucky Number Slevin (2006) – directed by Paul McGuigan; main character, Slevin Kelevra (Josh Hartnett) performs an elaborate con as a revenge
• The Real Hustle (2006 – present) — BBC series; actors playing a team of ex-grifters explain the secrets of the con to the public
• Kurosagi (2006) — Japanese drama that reflects on the art of different cons and swindling methods.Starring Yamashita Tomohisa
• Viva Pinata (2007) Features a character "The Bonboon" who is constantly pulling tricks on pinatas to get candy.
• Believe (2007) — directed by Loki Mulholland; a mockumentary about multi-level marketing
• The Riches (2007) — FX series about a nomadic, drifter family
• Liar Game (2007) — Japanese drama which is about a honest college student, receives 100 million yen (about $1,000,000) one day, along with a card saying that she has been chosen to participate in the "Liar Game". In order to win the game, she must trick other players.
• Futurama: Bender's Big Score (2007) — film based on the TV series of the same name; the villains of the film are Internet scammers
• Burn Notice (2007 – present) — USA Network series; an ex covert operative works as a freelance spy, with his jobs often taking the form of a con

Notable confidence tricks in literature

Nineteenth century

• The Confidence-Man (1857) — novel by Herman Melville; the main character tests confidence of other people
• Les Misérables (1862) — novel by Victor Hugo; the Thénardiers, two of the primary villains, scam money from people
• Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884) — novel by Mark Twain; two characters, The Duke and the Dauphin are grifters
• "The Red-Headed League" (1891) — Sherlock Holmes story by Arthur Conan Doyle, which involves a sort of confidence trick used to enable a bank robbery

Twentieth century

• Simon Templar (1928—1963), also known as "The Saint," a main character in Leslie Charteris' novels and stories who is often involved in scams and cons
• The Twelve Chairs (1928) and The Little Golden Calf (1931) – satirical novels by Ilf and Petrov; the main character, Ostap Bender, is a con man, who has carried out most of the tricks listed below, and The Little Golden Calf contains a fictional secret society of con men called Children of Lieutenant Schmidt
• The Space Merchants (1953) — sci-fi novel by Frederik Pohl and Cyril Kornbluth is replete with con games practiced by corporations
• Confessions of Felix Krull, Confidence Man: The Early Years (1954) – Thomas Mann's unfinished novel about a German con man
• The Stainless Steel Rat (1961 – present) – series of sci-fi novels by Harry Harrison; the protagonist, James Bolivar diGriz ("Slippery Jim"), is a con man and uses abundant schemes and frauds
• Travis McGee (1964–1984), fictional character in John D. MacDonald's series of detective novels, frequently uses con games or has them tried against him
• The Golden Egg (1984) — psychological thriller novel by Tim Krabbé features a chemistry teacher who employs con for the purpose of kidnapping
• Repairman Jack (1984–present), fictional character in F. Paul Wilson's series of novels, often runs scams on other con artists.
• If Tomorrow Comes (1985) — novel by Sidney Sheldon, which has a con artist as the main character and is mostly based on trickery and deception
• Hellblazer (1988 – present) — ongoing horror comic book series; the main character, John Constantine, uses confidence scams, trickery and magick

Twenty-first century

• The Brethren (2000) — novel by John Grisham features a con run by three incarcerated judges
• Matchstick Men (2002) — novel by Eric Garcia; the main characters are con artists
• American Gods (2001) — novel by Neil Gaiman uses a two-man con as a major plot element
• The Egyptologist (2004) — In this Arthur Phillips novel, Ralph Trilipush is a brilliant con who eventually cons himself.
• Going Postal (2004) — Terry Pratchett's Discworld novel features a convicted and condemned con artist Moist von Lipwig, who applies the principles of the con in his new job as Postmaster General
• The Lies of Locke Lamora (2006) — fantasy novel by Scott Lynch follows the adventures of a group of con artists known as the Gentlemen Bastards
• Many of the crime novels by Jim Thompson involve confidence artists

See also