Matchstick Men

An obsessive-compulsive con man (Nicolas Cage) meets the teenage daughter he never knew (Alison Lohman), just as he and his ambitious partner (Sam Rockwell) are gearing up for their biggest scam yet. Director Ridley Scott’s new comedy (written by Ted and Nicholas Griffin from a book by Eric Garcia) scampers through some downright outlandish twists in the last act, but Scott finesses them enough that the incredulity doesn’t hit you until you’re halfway to the car. But he more than compensates by making it a character study of yearning loneliness, doing his best work with actors since Thelma and Louise. Cage and Lohman are terrific. We’ve come to expect these volcanic surprises from Cage, but Lohman is a revelation: snarling and streetwise one minute and a tremulous princess the next.