'Focus’ review: Will Smith just stole $12 from your pocket 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Photo: Frank Masi / Frank Masi / Warner Bros. Pictures Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close Image 1 of 4 Will Smith plays Nicky and Margot Robbie is Jess in “Focus.” Will Smith plays Nicky and Margot Robbie is Jess in “Focus.” Photo: Frank Masi / Frank Masi / Warner Bros. Pictures Image 2 of 4 Will Smith plays a big-time swindler, with Margot Robbie as his latest apprentice, in “Focus.” Will Smith plays a big-time swindler, with Margot Robbie as his latest apprentice, in “Focus.” Photo: Frank Masi / Frank Masi / Warner Bros. Pictures Image 3 of 4 Margot Robbie and Will Smith in “Focus.” Margot Robbie and Will Smith in “Focus.” Photo: Frank Masi / Frank Masi / Warner Bros. Pictures Image 4 of 4 Adrian Martinez plays a con artist in “Focus.” Adrian Martinez plays a con artist in “Focus.” Photo: Associated Press 'Focus’ review: Will Smith just stole $12 from your pocket 1 / 4 Back to Gallery 
 
 February is the time for movies that look slick and promising but turn out to have something major wrong with them; otherwise, they’d be opening in May. The movie’s con is that it’s showing us a secret underworld, something real that we’ve never seen or imagined, that it’s revealing how the big boys operate. Once that’s realized, it’s possible to take it for what it is and enjoy it, a little. He’s on hiatus when he meets the creamy blond Jess Barrett (Robbie), who pulls a clumsy ruse that he plays along with simply from professional curiosity. Ficarra and Requa, who pulled off a more brazen act of sex and treachery in I Love You Philip Morris, here just want to have and provide a good time. But the emotional core of the movie, the relationship between Nicky and Jess, lacks impact, mostly because you can’t believe a word that they say, but also because Smith is not a strong leading man. Since Focus conjures up a more relaxed time in Hollywood history, when the top stars radiated their golden appeal in romantic comedies about duplicitous souls, writer-directors Glenn Ficarra and John Requa might have dreamed of Cary Grant and Grace Kelly, who paired in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1955 To Catch a Thief.
– Will Smith stars as Nicky, an established con man who takes on a new apprentice, Australian newcomer Margot Robbie's Jess, in Focus. They both love the con game, but who's playing who? Here's what critics are saying: Richard Corliss at Time is a fan. "The mix of longtime star and minx on the rise is one tasty element in the success of a movie that approaches the modest goals and effortless allure of a 60-year-old Hitchcock," he writes. Smith "takes a welcome break from glowering sci-fi roles" and writer-directors Glenn Ficarra and John Requa "deserve some credit in letting Will be Will in the star's first charm barrage since 2005's Hitch." Steven Rea at the Philadelphia Inquirer admits Smith "shows some of the movie-star wattage that's been missing from his recent pics. He charms." There's also "combustible chemistry" between Smith and Robbie, but the movie just "disappoints," Rea writes. "Even if you're willing to forgive its sinkhole plotholes and farthest-fetched conceits, the film ... ultimately makes no sense." Betsy Sharkey, on the other hand, says this "rom-com-con" is "an irresistible reminder of all the reasons we first fell for the Fresh Prince so many years ago." Writing at the Los Angeles Times, she notes the romantic role of Nicky fits Smith perfectly, while Robbie is "more than holding her own" as his match. "The scams are Rubik's Cube complicated, but what keeps you guessing is whether the romantic connection between Jess and Nicky is real or just another con." But Mick LaSalle at the San Francisco Chronicle isn't convinced. In a review titled "Will Smith just stole $12 from your pocket," he argues Focus is "ridiculous in every detail. It's a movie with no truth that teaches nothing and shows nothing, that has only its audacity to recommend it." Nicky and Jess lack "impact," partly because "Smith is not a strong leading man," he says. Viewers are left "waiting for the trick, which is not the same as being fooled."