Matchstick Men. Grifters. Con men. Flim Flam Men. The sheer volume of nicknames for a shabby career of trickery shows they're big business in America.

Small-time phone confidence tricksters Roy (Cage) and Frank (Rockwell) ply a dodgy trade selling bargain basement water filters for a fortune.

They tell gullible punters they're in line for fantastic prizes and then turn up in person as Federal Agents to warn the victims they've been had...and there's nothing to be done.

However, Roy - a tic-laden agoraphobic with a cleanliness obsession - neglects his medication, goes off the rails and heads off to another shrink.

His new psychoanalyst (Altman) suggests he might want to contact the daughter he never had and even arranges for him to meet her.

This follows in the grand tradition of American grifter movies, a fascination entertainingly if routinely explored in the recent Confidence.

Cage inhabits a similar downtrodden role to his screenwriter in Adaptation, a teeming mass of neuroses perfectly conveyed by his hangdog looks.

An underused Rockwell does what he needs to and Alison Lohman shows she's one to look out for in the future.

Nevertheless, this begins to sag a little about half-way through when it is brought back to life by a twist of the utmost conceit.

However, after you've picked your jaw up off the floor and mentally rewound the plot it doesn't really stand up to scrutiny.

Ridley Scott is a known quality as well as quantity and this excursion from his normal path will do just nicely until his next big one comes along.

Tim Evans