The reviews are out for Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson’s new comedy The Hustle are out and… well, they are not good.
Anne and Rebel both star in the new farce, a female-led remake of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, which sees them teaming up to con rich men who have wronged women out of their fortunes.
Critics seem decidedly underwhelmed by The Hustle, though, with film reviews website Rotten Tomatoes initially giving it a score of 0%, meaning no one had given it a positive write-up (via the Daily Express), though this has since risen to a slightly-more-respectable 18%.
Here’s a selection of what the critics are saying so far…
Rolling Stone (1/5)
“They say it’s all in the timing, especially when it comes to funny business. But in The Hustleeveryone’s inner comedic clock is calamitously off… Any comedian will tell you: Don’t let them see you sweat. This movie damn near drowns in perspiration.”
The Guardian (1/5)
“Anne Hathaway detonates a megaton blast of pure unfunniness in this terrifying film. She leaves behind a mushroom cloud of anti-humour, reducing every laugh possibility to grey-white ash in a postapocalyptic landscape of horror and despair.”
The Independent (1/5)
“The slapstick sequences… are never quite slick enough. The verbal interplay isn’t as witty as you might hope either. Smutty jokes about STDs, lesbian cops, drunken Essex girls and chastity belts don’t help.”
Irish Times (2/5)
“Rebel Wilson is left with far too much to do, and not enough material to work with, in every scene. Anne Hathaway’s accent is so appalling it drowns out all other considerations… It requires a catastrophic alignment to make such a dog’s dinner of a decent conceit, especially when everyone involved is plainly working terribly hard.”
“The Hustle, fun as some of it is, is a tall fizzy drink in which the fizz never completely rises to the top of the glass.”
“There are so many missed opportunities to make this film sharper… The Hustle goes from a forward-thinking female-centered modern reimagining to a silly, empty, and entirely useless remake.”
“Alas, those looking for a sharply feminist reinvention of this tale will have to wait another couple of decades.., moviegoers hoping for a mercilessly funny post-Weinstein revenge fantasy (its poster declares: ‘They’re giving dirty rotten men a run for their money’) will walk away feeling conned.”
“[There’s] not much that rises to the level of unforgettable, wild-eyed, laugh-out-loud hilarity. But… comedy is in a weird place right now, and The Hustle deserves some credit for fulfilling its own modest, escapist ambitions.”
The Hustle arrives in UK cinemas on Friday May 10.