• How to Legally Apply The Rules of Con: Guy Ritchie's Revolver

    edited by Alexander Becker

    This post is part of The Subjective Reality Series.

    You can only get smarter by playing a smarter opponent.

    In 2005, Guy Ritchie made an extraordinary movie that's apparently not recognized for what it is. Here is the plot summary from IMDb --

    Jake Green is a hotshot gambler, long on audacity and short on common sense. He's rarely allowed to play in any casino because he is a winner. Jake has taken in so much money over the years, he is the only client of his accountant and older brother Billy. One night, Jake, Billy and their other brother Joe are invited to sit in on a private game, where Jake is expected to lose to Dorothy Macha, a crime boss and local casino owner who can't play for squat, but always wins because people are too scared to beat him. Jake isn't afraid of Macha, and not only beats Dorothy in a quick game of chance, but takes every possible opportunity to insult the man. Jake and his brothers leave the game, and Macha puts out the order for a hit on Jake, who ends up working for and being protected by a pair of brothers, Avi and Zach, who are out to take Macha down.

    Let's take a look beyond the plot and see what the characters say, who is who, and what is what. You obviously need to see the movie before reading the comments, in fact, they may appear to make even less sense than the film itself but once you've seen the film, everything will be fine. Really.

    Spoiler warning

    What is so fascinating about the rules of con -- besides the fact that they do apply to all of us? Without exception.

    To be clear, this is not about teaching you the rules of confidence tricks in order to con other people. Quite the opposite; take a look at how you (in)advertently con yourself and make it work for you instead of having it work against you.

    Prison

    Jake Green after leaving prison --

    One thing I've learned in the last seven years: in every game and con there's always an opponent, and there's always a victim. The trick is to know when you're the latter, so you can become the former.

    The quotes that accompany the chapters of the movie --

    The greatest enemy will hide in the last place you would ever look. --Julius Cesar; 75 BC

    What about the mind itself, right behind fear?

    The only way to get smarter is by playing a smarter opponent. --Fundamentals of Chess; 1885

    Who's your ultimate opponent? You.

    First rule of business, protect your investment. --Etiquette of the Banker; 1775

    Protect your belief?

    There is no avoiding war, it can only be postponed to the advantage of your enemy. --Niccolo Machiavelli; 1502

    To save the ego?

    Jake Green, upon deciding against taking the elevator, which he fears --

    Why should a man do, what he doesn't like to do?

    Dorothy Macha

    Dorothy Macha, meeting Jake on the gambling table --

    What's in it for me?

    Dorothy Macha, trying to evoke fear in Jake.

    You're a man who needs a master.

    Liberation from Macha?

    Jake Green, while winning the game of chance against Macha.

    Purple, between blue and white on the color spectrum.

    Jake's intuition

    On his way out, Jake's got a hunch, he encounters his intuition which has gotten reinforced after Jake's winning the game of chance against Macha. Jake decides to act against intuition, he takes the stairs and breaks down and falls.

    Another "hunch" prevents Jake Green from being assassinated by Macha's killers. He's on the right path now. Saved and rescued by -- intuition.

    The killer himself -- Sorter -- is getting doubts. The hitman is conscience itself.

    Zach and Avi. Loan Sharks. Chess. They force Jake to do everything he doesn't like to do, as the only way to cure his fatal disease under two non-negotiable conditions --

    1. You have to give away all your money.
    2. Do not argue and do answer any question asked.

    The confidence trick

    If there's a rule, you can bend it.
    If there's a law, it can be broken.

    Jake Green, after facing choice and fatal disease --

    From now on, I am bending all the rules, because desperate men do desperate deeds.

    ... and not any earlier than that.

    Jake's money is his pride -- it even smells proud, says Avi.

    People come to Zach and Avi, the loan sharks, only as the last option, the last resort, when they have no choice anymore.

    People only get sensible when it's (almost) too late.

    The three Eddies

    Three Eddies, flash, loud, proud, and stupid, where proud refers to Macha, who happens to stand between loud and stupid. In the next scene, Jake takes the proud spot between the Eddies. The three Eddies, flash, loud, and stupid are dead. Evolution.

    Jake Green, citing one of the principles of the con --

    I know nothing hurts more than humiliation and a little money loss.

    ... and slowly starts accepting his reality --

    Don't try to make sense out of it, not now, because it doesn't make sense. I just know if you start a job then finish it.

    Sam Gold

    Macha and Sam Gold. Lilly Walker represents Gold. Eight pawns by her side, the rules of the game Gold/Walker sets the rules and the pawns. Ego. Everyone serves Gold. Gold is religion.

    Jake keeps winning in games of chess against Avi. He learned the game and honed his skills in prison, between a chess master and a master con man, after all. The objective is now to --

    ... create the ultimate con and win the ultimate game.

    Jake's already in the ultimate game.

    Here are the rules --

    1. You can only get smarter by playing a smarter opponent.
    2. The more sophisticated the game, the more sophisticated the opponent.

    Jake finally releases himself and stops resisting --

    I pay for my own pain and a part of me dies every time I think about it.

    A part of your ego dies -- and that's the whole point. Green learns that everyone has to pay what he owes.

    Jake Green vs. Dorothy Macha and vs. Sam Gold. Jake Green vs. Lord John, Macha's competitor. Jake Green plays Lord John against Dorothy Macha and Macha against Gold.

    The powder is for Gold, it is food for the ego, pride, vanity, arrogance, addiction.

    The awakening

    Jake's awakening puts to sleep anybody else.

    There is no such thing as problems, only situations. --Avi & Zach

    When Avi asks Jake how he keeps winning in chess he replies --

    You do the hard work, I just help you along.

    ... to feed pieces to you and make you believe you took those pieces.

    In every game and con there is always an opponent and there is always a victim, the more control the victim thinks he has, the less control he actually has.

    The formula is completely consistent.

    ... inside an environment he can control. The bigger the environment, the easier the control. ... so the opponent simply distracts their victim by getting them consumed with their own consumption.

    The bigger the trick and the older the trick, the easier it is to pull, because --

    1. They think it can't be that old,
    2. They think it can't be that big,

    ... for so many people to have fallen for it.

    Eventually, when the opponent is challenged or questioned, it means the victim's investment and thus his intelligence is questioned, no one can accept that. Not even to themselves.

    You'll always find a good opponent in the very last place you'd ever look.

    In your own mind.

    Gold -- the godfather -- doesn't touch Zach and Avi.

    Avi & Zach providing some hints to Jake --

    You can't see what's right in front of you.

    Rachel, Jake Green's niece. Good. Pure. Innocence.

    More revelations

    Jake Green gains some more insight --

    There is something about yourself that you don't know. Something that you will deny even exists, until it's too late to do anything about it. It's the only reason you get up in the morning. The only reason you suffer the shitty puss, the blood, the sweat and the tears. This is because you want people to know how good, attractive, generous, funny, wild and clever you really are. Fear or revere me, but please, think I'm special.

    We share an addiction.

    We're approval junkies.

    Ego gratification. Even the car accident would have been some sort of approval.

    Jake Green's conning the three Eddies --

    Nobody kills a man who's going to make him money.

    Lord John, with a hot girl under his eyes and a beautiful assassin under his command --

    Beauty is a destructive angel, how could anything that looks so good be so bad?

    Dorothy Macha, after the foiled assassination attempt --

    Greed gets them all in the end.

    Avi explains the game --

    You've heard their voice for so long, you believe it to be you. Mr Gold is pretending to be you. Everyone is in his game and nobody knows it.

    He's behind all the pain there ever was. Behind every crime ever committed. Embrace the pain and you will win this game.

    If you change the rules on what controls you, you will change the rules on what you can control.

    The more power you think you have in Gold's world, the less power you have in the real world.

    The end of pride

    Jake donates to charity in Macha's name to further illustrate and manifest the difference between the both of them.

    Jake apologizes to Macha.

    Avi teaches --

    Use your perceived enemy to destroy your real enemy.

    Controlled vs. free man. Forgiveness is the ultimate act of liberation. No pride.

    The end of ego

    Jake Green, struggling with ego, pride, and fear --

    Wherever you don't want to go is where you will find him.

    Meeting the ego in the elevator. Stuck in the voluntarily taken elevator between the 14th and the 12th floor, Jake is struggling with his ego, the ultimate showdown.

    The greatest con, that he ever pulled... was making you believe... that he is you. --Avi

    You are not your ego.

    Liberation. Jake is invincible now. Macha isn't able to shoot nor impress him anymore. No fear.

    Macha gets and takes the credit for the donation, thus again feeding his vanity and ego which earns him a strange applause from Mr Gold.

    Macha demonstrates his adherence to the system by eventually begging and submitting to Gold. Fear.

    Sorter, the hitman, in a twisted scene, hinting at the bigger picture --

    None of this is real.

    Avi and Zach, the chess master and the master of con ultimately aren't real either.

    Liberation

    Avi's epilogue --

    Nobody knows where the enemy is. They don't even know he exists. He's in every one of their heads. And they trust him because they think they are him.

    If you try to destroy him to save them, they'll destroy you to save him.

    Jake loses the last game of chess with Avi, he left the game through his own liberation.

    Zach and Avi finally reveal it --

    We didn't do this because we like you. We did this because we are you.

    The ultimate con, the ultimate confidence trick, is absolute -- yet delicate -- confidence in your self. Beyond ego, that is.

    The greatest con, that he ever pulled... was making you believe... that he is you.--Avi

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