The Con - Ideas needed

[Inglorious Fiction]

Hey everyone,

I've just started writing a film based around a group of con men/grifters, with one central character who narrates the film (similar to a Guy Ritchie style)

I'm rather stuck and any ideas would be greatly appreciated. I'll most likely put all the ideas together for the film or if I base the film majorly around one idea, that person will be credited with a 'based on' etc.

Cheers guys,
Josh

 

[Aaron M]

You mean you're stuck trying to think up a clever con for them to pull?

 

[Inglorious Fiction]

Just ideas in general, I have an idea for a con, but how to get around to it and so on I'm struggling with

 

[CamVader]

Just ideas in general, I have an idea for a con, but how to get around to it and so on I'm struggling with

We can play opposites here. We have con men that have no moral issue with what they do, but yet have an honor code between them that was violated in the past that must be repaired if they are ever going to pull off this con.

Could be a bunch of things: non-payment of a bet the other insists was never a bet, dating another's sister, not getting invited to a wedding, etc. It doesn't have to be serious, just some real hard feelings of betrayal and the process of making friends (trust) again.

And you can twist in some serious betrayal at the end to bookend the deal. They're con men after all.

 

[Aaron M]

Something involving taking over a television station and conning a small city en mass.
Would have to revolve around motivating a large group of people to do something in one night/morning. Much longer would stretch the limits of plausibility...

 

[DirtyPicturesTV]

Have you at least seen 'The Sting"? Maybe "House of Games"?

Many places to steal -- I mean, get inspiration from.

Good con movies feature lots of reversals, betrayal, and heavy consequences for failing.

Always start with storytelling basics: Who's getting conned? What do the con men want to get? Why do they want to get it? What happens if they don't get it? Who or what is trying to stop them from getting it?

 

[SiCurious]

Good con ideas involve setting up a con the audience can see coming, and then "zoom out" at the end to reveal an even greater con that nobody expected (and then zooming out one last time to reveal an even greater con!) The Sting, as mentioned above, has a great example of that, and The Brothers Bloom uses it numerous times to leave the audience unsure of what is real and what is a con. See also The Usual Suspects and The Game.

As for getting round to things, do we want the con men to succeed? If they succeed will there be dire consequences for innocent/likeable characters who get caught up in it? In which case, is it possible that the conmen are themselves conned by a greater and more mysterious element? It's important to leave clues so the audience can guess the con, but hide them, or remove their context, so they don't appear to be clues until the audience watches the film for a second time.

 

[freedom crusader]

Hey everyone,

I've just started writing a film based around a group of con men/grifters, with one central character who narrates the film (similar to a Guy Ritchie style)

I'm rather stuck and any ideas would be greatly appreciated. I'll most likely put all the ideas together for the film or if I base the film majorly around one idea, that person will be credited with a 'based on' etc.

Cheers guys,
Josh

The story wills itself into existence because it has a point. You need to make this point. Set up your situation, and if you puzzle it out step by step, instead of imposing a formula, then you will encounter obstacles to your plot that you will have to solve for the plot to be convincing.

For example -- lot of movies just kill people and leave the bodies, as if nothing is going to happen to the people who killed them, but in many cases the homicides can be traced back to them by surveillance cameras, witnesses, paper trails, phone records, diaries, etc. If you pay attention to the details, problems like this will crop up and the solution is the resolution of the story.

But the driving force is your point, the reason you wanted to write the story in the first place, so you have to make that point in the end. Are you trying to say con men are fun, or elucidate a relationship within the group, or make a point about society...?

 

[CHamburger]

We can play opposites here. We have con men that have no moral issue with what they do, but yet have an honor code between them that was violated in the past that must be repaired if they are ever going to pull off this con.

Could be a bunch of things: non-payment of a bet the other insists was never a bet, dating another's sister, not getting invited to a wedding, etc. It doesn't have to be serious, just some real hard feelings of betrayal and the process of making friends (trust) again.

And you can twist in some serious betrayal at the end to bookend the deal. They're con men after all.

This is a solid start man. Kind of like a usual suspects kinda thing.

Heres my input, I like a solid background for the characters, in your case the conmen. How did they meet, have they pulled a job together before? Is anyone a new "recruit"? This could definitley tie into CamVader's ideas of an honor code that was violated or a couple of his other bits etc. I alwasy liked in con movies or any male bonding movie, where they talked about the issues in their own lives and they always have opposing beliefs, like in Rocknrolla, one of the conmen is going to prison and there's the whole gay/a favor for a friend who's going to jail conversation. Those add more humanity to the story and make it more solid and believable.

 

[Nate North]

Dude, this is an easy one

Make a "based on a true story" film about the Dolphin Independent film con, that made 15 million dollars a few weeks ago, and got a number of people arrested.

So these guys right, they go out there, and while we are all breaking our backs trying to present an honest plan to investors, they opened up a telemarketing bank.

Their story was the kind of weak minded eco-drivel that gets a lot of housewife donations.

"We'll make another film about the plight of dolphins, and then all you suburbanites will rush out to rent diving gear and boats to combat dolphin unfairness"

(I like dolphins, I just don't think these self important movies do anything about the problem)

So they start calling and going door to door, and here is their promise "10x your money back, guaranteed"

So any person with a 70 IQ should have known better right?

They raised 15 million dollars

When it came time to make the film, their total idiocy stepped out into the light of day. They spent 70k on the production, released the film, and it flopped.

Investors lost everthing, and the filmmakers tried to shrug it off. I believe they are all going to jail now. Hope so. It's a real black eye to all of us what these guys did. I think someone should tell this story, not as a story about independent film, but as a story about criminals pretending to be us.

 

[Aaron M]

+1 for Dolphin Independent. If not the OP than someone.

Idiots failing is as much fun to watch as brilliant people winning.

come to think of it - that might be a good film right there.. contrast two teams, one a bunch of idiots failing, and the other a bunch of geniuses succeeding.

 

[DirtyPicturesTV]

Wow. Awesome marketing plan.

Simply involve Dolphins, maybe baby seals. Then promise 1000% percent ROI. Boom! Instant prison sentence.

 

[Nate North]

Wow. Awesome marketing plan.

Simply involve Dolphins, maybe baby seals. Then promise 1000% percent ROI. Boom! Instant prison sentence.

You've nailed the formula, it's just one of those moments where you say, "why didn't I think of this incredibly roundabout way of getting thrown in jail and having it publicized nationally that I'm a moron"

 

[freedom crusader]

Inglorious Fiction -- you say you already have the idea of the con, so suggesting types of cons is not what you need at this point.

There is a type of plot mentioned by Georges Polti in his book "36 Dramatic Situations."
It is Plot Number III (3): Crime Pursued by Vengeance.
Plot number V (5) is Pursuit.
Plot XXX (30) is Ambition.

Polti says these plots can be combined. For example, a young man has to raise money to go to college to get a degree to get a legitimate job, but he must do the con to get the money (Ambition). But he is pursued afterward by one of the victims or relative of a victim of the con (Crime pursued by Vengeance, etc).

A fourth plot that can be added is Number XIX (19) Slaying of a Kinsmen Unrecognized. In other words, in committing the con and trying to escape, the hero unwittingly kills someone who turns out to be related to him. I would avoid that horrible Hollywood cliche of having the hero's little girl kidnapped as a plot motive.

 

[Nate North]

excellent advice about the book.

I didn't mean to derail your original idea OP, it's just that when you said "con film" I immediately jumped to something that had gotten a lot of recent publicity. For filmmakers without a lot of money, sometimes doing a story people have heard of and wanted to know more about can be a way to get audiences to watch films without stars.

I think that "based on a true story" makes potential viewers curious as well.

I'm sure your original concept is great, just trying to brainstorm with you.