The Sting story
The Sting is a 1973 American caper film. Set in 1936, it involves a complicated plot by two professional grifters (Paul Newman and Robert Redford) to con a mob boss (Robert Shaw). The film was directed by George Roy Hill, who had directed Newman and Redford in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969). The screenplay by David S. Ward was inspired by real-life cons perpetrated by brothers Fred and Charley Gondorff and documented by David Maurer in his 1940 book The Big Con: The Story of the Confidence Man.
16 total · 2 choice · 6 major · 8 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| con artistry | choice | The story revolves around a gang of grifters pulling of the con of the century. |
| the desire for vengeance | choice | Doyle Lonnegan was a spiteful man and driven by his desire to avenge himself on both Gondorf and Hooker for having conned him in a card game, and for stealing from his courier, respectively. As Hooker in the end refused his share of the win, it is reasonable to think his motivation for participating was, in some part, a similar vindictiveness against Lonnegan. |
| betrayal | major | Hooker pretended to be in league with Lonnegan in order to con him. Hooker appeared to betray his mentor, Gondorf, to the FBI agent Polk, though in the end Polk was revealed to be in on the whole con. |
| gambling | major | Key to the plot was Hooker and Gondorf conning Lonnegan into betting half a million dollars in the horse races. Gondorf cheated Lonnegan at the poker table just as Lonnegan had tried to cheat him. In an ill-advised play, Hooker bet his $3000 cut of a successful con job on red at the roulette wheel and lost it all. |
| greed for riches | major | Lonnegan was avaricious to the extreme and Gondorf used this to con him into betting half a million dollars on, what he had been gulled to believe, was an insider tip in the horse races. |
| law enforcement | major | The corrupt cop Lieutenant Snyder was tasked by Lonnegan to track down Hooker and send him to meet his maker. A key part of Hooker and Gondorf's con job involved a fake FBI agent, named Polk, feigning to coerce Hooker into betraying Gondorf. |
| mentor and protégé | major | Hooker sought out Gondorf in order to learn from this renowned con artist. |
| organized crime | major | The main villain in the story was the mob boss Doyle Lonnegan. The plot turned on Hooker and Gondorf hatching an elaborate scheme to con the mob boss Doyle Lonnegan out of $500,000 of his not so honestly earned money. |
| cheating | minor | Gondorf cheated Lonnegan at the poker table just as Lonnegan had tried to cheat him. |
| coping with the death of a spouse | minor | Alva was distraught upon seeing her husband Luther's dead body in the alleyway. |