History Film / TheSting

* StabTheScorpion: The bodyguard steps around the corner into an alley and fires a silenced gun, apparently at Hooker. [[spoiler:He kills Loretta, then reveals that she's actually the assassin Loretta ''Salino'', who's been assigned the hit on Hooker and was about to kill him]].

* NoGoodDeedGoesUnpunished: Mottola the cash runner doesn't volunteer to take down the pickpocket, but he rush up to see if Luther is OK and hand back his envelope, which is what allows the con artists to tempt him with a huge payday and get his own cash stolen. However, he turns into an AssholeVictim when he decides to steal what he believes is a free payday.

The film was nominated for ten UsefulNotes/{{Academy Award}}s, winning seven (including Best Picture). It is also one of the biggest box office hits of all time; when adjusted for inflation, it currently sits as the 19th-best domestic earner of all time according to [=BoxOfficeMojo.com=].

* DisproportionateRetribution: Lonnegan is not the kind of man who accepts being fooled, in any way, shape or form. He makes clear to [[TheDragon Floyd]] that he would kill a man who he considers a very personal friend if that man beat him at a golf game by cheating and he orders the manhunt of the con artists who took just ''one'' of his number racket envelopes.

* ImplausibleCorneredEscape: Johnny flees from an armed thug sent by the vengeful BigBad, running into an alley behind a diner, which presents him with a dead end. The gunman is only moments away from cornering and killing Johnny then and there. [[spoiler:Apparently, adrenaline gave Johnny enough strength to lift a steel manhole cover, and escape into the sewer below.]]

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Albeit brief. [[spoiler: J.J. Singleton warns Gondorff before the poker game that Lonnegan likes to rig four of a kind hands with low cards for his opponent versus "eights or nines." During the actual game, that information obviously sets the alarm bells going for Gondorff when he's dealt four threes, and allows him to settle on the higher four of a kind in Jacks, since he knows the highest hand Lonnegan rigs for himself is nines.]]

* CuffsOffRubWrists: Detective Snyder arrests Hooker and takes him to meet with Special Agent Polk of the F.B.I. Polk tells Snyder to take off Hooker's handcuffs and Hooker rubs his wrists after he does.

-->'''Hooker:''' If Snyder knows about us, so does everybody else. He never gets anything first

* DreamTeam: There is a roster and a casting to assemble one, with a token novice too. Gondorff remarks he would be able to recruit a crew of three hundred con artists.

* YouGotSpunk: Kid Twist tells Joe Erie (who wants in on the con) that he's got moxie for keeping his mouth shut when Snyder beats him up for not talking and being snarky instead. Consequently, Joe is allowed to join the con team even though he doesn't have the experience of the others.

* AmbiguousSyntax: The final con hinges on the fact that you can ''place'' a bet for a horse to ''place'' (i.e. come in 2nd).

* BlackDudeDiesFirst: Luther.

* ConfiscatedPhone: Hooker pulls a woman making out of a call out of a pay phone booth in order to try to call Luther before [[spoiler: he's murdered]], then runs off to try and reach him. Hooker's friend is left behind, being swatted by the woman and her purse because she lost her nickel and wants it back.
* ConspicuousConsumption: [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]]. After Hooker pulls off a big con at the start of the film, he takes out a woman with a promise of showering her with luxuries during the evening (Specifically, that he will spend $50 on her). However, he blows the entire take on a single (rigged) roulette spin, and she leaves in disgust at the wasted evening.

* DatingCatwoman: [[spoiler: Loretta, the waitress]], who saves Hooker's life and with whom he then spends the night, turns out to be [[spoiler: the feared hired killer Loretta Salino]], who all along intended to kill him herself.
* DeadpanSnarker

-->'''Hooker''': You are afraid of him.
-->'''Gondorff''': Right down to my socks, buster.

* KansasCityShuffle: [[spoiler: We know we're watching a con, then the movie ''cons the audience'' into thinking (1) Hooker had agreed to turn Gondorff in to the FBI; (2) Hooker and Gondorff were killed until we see that it was all a setup.]]

* KilledOffScreen: [[spoiler: Mottola (the money runner Hooker's crew steals the $11,000 from in the first scene) was found in a quarry with a knife in his eye.]]

-->'''Lonnegan''' What was I supposed to do? Call him for cheating better than me in front of the others?

-->'''Hooker''': If Snyder knows about us, so does everybody else. He never gets anything first

--> Horse Face Lee, Slim Miller, Suitcase Murphy and the Big Alabama are in from New Orleans; Crying Jonesy and the Boone Kid from Denver; Dippy Burke and Limehouse Chappie from New York ...

* SamusIsAGirl: [[spoiler: Salino]]'s first name is Loretta.

-->'''Floyd:''' We can't let him get away with that.
-->'''Lonnegan:''' What was I supposed to do? Call him for cheating better than me in front of the others?

-->'''Gondorff:''' Glad to meet you, kid, you're a real horse's ass.
-->'''Hooker:''' Luther said I could learn something from you. I already know how to drink!
* StabTheScorpion: The bodyguard steps around the corner into an alley and fires a silenced gun, apparently at Hooker. [[spoiler: He kills Loretta, then reveals that she's actually the assassin Loretta ''Salino'', who's been assigned the hit on Hooker and was about to kill him]].
* StagedShooting: [[spoiler: Hooker and Gondorff, as part of their Big Con.]]

* TwistEnding: First, Lonnegan hires Salino to kill Hooker, and when Hooker is walking through an alley, smiles, seeing his girlfriend, a man behind Hooker pulls out a gun, points it, and shoots [[spoiler: her. Turns out he's a body guard Gondorff hired to protect Hooker, and Hooker's girlfriend was actually Salino, the assassin who would have killed him.]] Second, the FBI guys bust into the gambling den to arrest Gondorff, and per their promise, let Hooker go. At this point, [[spoiler: Gondorf shoots Hooker, and the FBI guy shoots Gondorff. The FBI guy has the cop rush Lonnegan out of the place. After they leave, Gondorff and Hooker get up, with blood stains like they've been shot. We then find out it was a [[FakingTheDead scam]] to make both the cop and Lonnegan think they're both dead.]]

* {{Wipe}}

* MeaningfulLook: Each con man arriving in Chicago casually flick his nose with his right index finger to signal that he's "in" on the plan to fleece Doyle Lonnegan.

* RabidCop: Lieutenant Snyder. His EstablishingCharacterMoment is pulling a borderline-CarFu DynamicEntry on Hooker in order to muscle all of Hooker's share of the runner's money out of him, he intimidates and beats up his way through the Chicago underworld to find Hooker, pulls a second DynamicEntry-slash-ClickHello on Hooker ''by smashing his pistol-packing hand through a phone booth's glass''... there is also the fact that Snyder is a cop from Joliet, Illinois and probably doesn't has jurisdiction in Chicago, yet he continues to act like he has full authority.

* EpisodeTitleCardL Each named act is introduced by a hand-drawn title card.

* BusCrash: [[spoiler: Mottola (the money runner Hooker's crew steals the $11,000 from in the first scene) was found in a quarry with a knife in his eye.]]

* ChekhovsGun: A very quick one. When it's time to get ready to pull the Big Con, Hooker is seen putting something in his mouth while standing in front of his mirror. [[spoiler: It's the blood bag that he uses to fake BloodFromTheMouth at the climax.]]

* ConspicuousConsumption: [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]]. After Hooker pulls off a big con at the start of the film, he takes out a woman with a promise of showering her with luxuries during the evening (Specifically, that he will spend $50 on her). However, he blows the entire take on a single (rigged) roulette spin and she leaves in disgust at the wasted evening.

* EpisodeTitleCard

** Hooker is in the middle of a short con, so he deliberately projects the image of a random and unsympathetic bystander. Some clues about his deception may be picked up in hindsight.
** As mentioned above, Gondorff appears to be an alcoholic washout in his first appearance, but he is a ConsummateProfessional and one of the best con artists out there. Invoked in-universe a second time when ''Shaw'' comes across as a drunken slob to Lonnegan when the two first met.

* FixingTheGame: Henry Gondorff joins Doyle Lonnegan's poker game aboard a Chicago-bound train, and he's on a run. Donegan tries to use a loaded deck after a break, and when hands are called, he has four nines. Initially, Gondorff was dealt four threes, but when he shows his hand, he has four Jacks. When Donegan asks Johnny Hooker (who is sent to collect his winnings) how Gondorff won, Hooker merely says, "he cheats." (How Gondorff cheated is never explained or demonstrated, but as a con artist himself, it's rendered academic.)
** The cheat explained: J. J. meets with Gondorff before the game with information that Lonnegan likes to "cold-deck low, eights and nines." Cold-decking is slang for stacking a deck to give yourself better cards, in this case four eights or four nines. J. J. also says that Lonnegan likes to play with either a Tally-Ho Fan or a Tally-Ho Circle, and he "got [him] one of each." This is so that Gondorff can make sure his swapped cards are the right brand. Put together, J. J. tells him that Lonnegan will give Gondorff four of a kind, but something lower than eight, and give himself four eights or four nines. This is Gondorff's cue to swap in four of something better than nine, like the four Jacks he gives himself. (Incidentally, Lonnegan himself asks his goon to "stack [him] a cooler, Floyd. Nines and threes," where a "cooler" is a stacked deck, and he swaps it in on the cut by covering the whole deck when he cuts. Which is exactly why you aren't supposed to cut cards with your whole hands like that.)
** Earlier in the movie, Hooker loses $3000 on a fixed roulette spin.

* HollywoodSilencer: A silenced revolver (And it's not a Nagant or one of the obscure designs purpose made for the folks at UsefulNotes/MoscowCentre) appears at one point.

* LonelyPianoPiece: The film features a piece called Solace, done both as a piano solo only and as well as an orchestral version. And yes, it's played during the rain.

* MenAreTheExpendableGender: Averted. Hooker begins a relationship with a waitress who (unknown to him and the audience) is actually an assassin contracted by Lonnegan to kill him. She is killed before she can do it by a bodyguard hired by Gondorff. The moment itself is shocking, but there is no angst or condemnation about it - she might as well have been a male hitman.

* SexFaceTurn: Averted with Loretta. [[spoiler: She sleeps with Johnny Hooker because she's the hitman "Salino" who's been hired to kill him. Somewhat played with because the character the audience thinks is the hitman is actually a bodyguard hired by Gondorff for Johnny's protection. It doesn't hurt that up until the very last second, [[PlotTwist the audience thinks that the only person who would help Johnny has just been shot by the 'man' gunning for him.]]]]

* TrouserSpace: Johnny Hooker demonstrates trouser space when suggesting that a money courier should hide his money there. This was a trick. During the demonstration, Hooker switched the courier's money for a wad of plain paper. This con is called The Jamaican / Hankie switch.

* TheUnreveal: The audience [[spoiler:never sees how Gondorff switched out his bad cards for the four Jacks.]]

** You CAN place a bet for a horse to place. However it comes with shorter odds, and, thus, a smaller payout. You can also bet for a horse to show (come in 3rd) at even shorter odds. If you bet on a horse to show, you win, at the show payout, if the horse finishes in the top 3. If you bet on a horse to place, you win, at the place payout if the horse finishes 1st or 2nd. For a win bet, the horse must come in first to receive the payout. That is why the winner is listed with 3 payouts (Win, Place, and Show), and you even hear J.J. (Ray Walston), pretending to be the race caller, give the payouts for the winner in the race he was reading off the ticker. [[spoiler:Since this bet was ''The Sting'' (when the mark loses the money), it wouldn't actually matter that the odds are shorter since the mark was intended to lose, but he has to think he's making the bank breaking bet, so he needs winning odds that would do that.]]

** Played very straight with Lonnegan, who casually talks to his Dragon while playing golf in an upstate New York club that he will kill anybody who tries to dupe, mock, or steal from him in any way whatsoever (even the long-time friend that he's playing golf with) and to put more effort into finding the men who stole from him to MakeAnExampleOfThem; showcasing that his sophistication and [[StraightEdgeEvil straight-edgedness]] are just a mask for a HairTriggerTemper, DisproportionateRetribution, KillEmAll-happy brute (and, quite justifiably, TheDreaded).

* YouGotSpunk: Kid Twist tells Joe Erie (who wants in on the con) that he's got moxie for keeping his mouth shut when Snyder beats him up for not talking and being snarky instead.

* ComplexityAddiction: Salino's plan to [[spoiler:become a LoveInterest to Hooker so she (and only she) can kill him. She starts it by posing as a waitress and could have killed him several times throughout the film, even while Hooker was sleeping, or allowed Lonnegan's goons to capture him at one point, and sure enough when she finally tries she is identified and shot, on an open street, by the bodyguard Gondorff secretly hired for Hooker.]]

* AssholeVictim: Mottola, the mob money runner that Hooker and Luther con in the opening of the film. It's hard to feel sorry for his getting scammed out of $10,000 considering he ''thought ''he was taking Luther for 5 grand. And laughing about it.

* PuttingTheBandBackTogether: Henry Gondorff contacting his old crew.

* AwesomeMcCoolName: Kid Twist (''Kid Twist!'') wants to know who else is available for the big con:
--> Horse Face Lee, Slim Miller, Suitcase Murphy and the Big Alabama are in from New Orleans; Crying Jonesy and the Boone Kid from Denver; Dippy Burke and Limehouse Chappie from New York ...