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School for Scoundrels at the Movies: Short Cons in Film and Video

Television and the cinema can sometimes provide a source for performing and patter ideas, although the depictions of three-card monte in film are often inaccurate. There are a few performances, however, that are especially notable for either their acuracy in depicting a scam or for their colorful patter or other performing ideas. We are all editors here. Just click on the "Edit page" button at the very bottom left of this window, and you will be taken to a screen where you can edit anything on this page.

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Three-Card Monte in Film

Honky Tonk, 1941. Funny scene with Clark Gable as a con man (based on Soapy Smith) about to be tarred and feathered by a mob of suckers. He talks his way out with an offer to explain three-card monte. Pretty authentic in its depiction of the con men’s gambling paraphernalia as well as of the process of tarring and feathering and riding the rail. The hand inserts were done by magician John Calvert. Review

Kiss the Blood off my Hands, 1948. Burt Lancaster throws monte on a train for an amateur magician with disastrous results. Shows the importance of qualifying the mark. Review

The Sting II, 1983. This is a terrible movie featuring Jackie Gleason and Mac Davis in the roles originally played by Paul Newman and Robert Redford, but it features Tony Giorgio doing an excellent three-card monte sequence on a pool table. Review

Mississippi Gambler, 1953. Tyrone Power as a professional gambler who takes an old pro at his own game of three-card monte. Good depiction of the “rube act.” Review

The Flim-Flam Man, 1967. George C. Scott and Michael Sarrazin take a country store full of yokels with the monte. Shows him using a roll of fake money wound with a real bill, a common practice even back in the steamship days. Jay Ose is the consultant and plays the part of the grocer. Review

Waterhole # 3, 1967. Includes an excellent sequence with James Coburn throwing the monte. The insert hands are Jay Ose’s, who also appears in the scene as the bartender. The play ends with all three cards having bent corners—one of Jay’s many, many endings for his routine. Review

My Chauffeur, 1986. Penn as a con man and Teller as his oil-sheik victim at three-card monte, plucked while riding in a limousine. Funny though improbable scene. Review

The Super, 1991. Joe Pesci as the sucker in a very well done three-card monte scene. Everything is true to the game—the cardboard boxes with a windbreak and newspaper, the way the cards are bent and handled, the way the shills operate, and the operator’s patter and attitude—excellent consultant work by someone not listed in the credits. Pesci displays a rare, extremely good-natured reaction to being burned. Review

Mo’ Money, 1992. Damon Wayans as a con-artist. Lackluster three-card monte game. Review

Hearts in Atlantis, 2001. Anthony Hopkins helps a young boy to use his ESP to beat the monte. Review

Shell Game in Film

Three Card Monte in Television

From television’s cartoon series, The Simpsons:

Bart's Comet - 2/5/95 (Bart tosses monte at a school fair.) Review

The Springfield Connection - 5/14/95
(A recurring character named Snake throws monte on the street and swindles Homer out of $20.) Review

Scenes from the Class Struggle in Springfield - 2/4/96
(While the family gets ready to visit an exclusive country club, Bart practices his monte throws until his mother warns him, "Bart, I told you, ‘No grifting.’") Review

Whit Haydn∞