Sleight of Hand

A hood named EVERETT (Christian Slater) steals a rare gold coin from a safe in a mansion and leads the coin’s owner on an intense chase. The owner is none other than TERRIBLE TERRY (Peter Stormare), the most notorious gangster in the city. Everett is caught, but not before he stashes the coin in a random vending machine.

It turns out the vending machine is the property of RICHY (Ray Liotta), a blue collar guy whose family business allows him to barely get by. Richy’s pal DOZER (Anthony Anderson), a narcoleptic ne’er do well, secretly takes the coin to an American buyer named SHELDON (Jon Lovitz), in hopes that he can prove to Richy that he’s useful for something. But Terry comes looking for his coin. When he’s told it’s not there, he holds Richy responsible. Terrible Terry gives Richy six days to find the coin or pay him millions. If Richy fails, Terry promises to kill his son, VJ.

Sheldon buys the coin from Dozer, who falls asleep before he can collect the money, and Sheldon splits the scene with the coin and the money. Meanwhile, a New York gangster named CARMINE spots Sheldon while vacationing with his family. Sheldon owes him a ton of money, so Carmine sends for NICKY (Ving Rhames) and TONY (Thomas Jane) to come and off Sheldon. Meanwhile, Everett strikes a deal with Terry’s right hand woman BRIGETTE.  In exchange for his freedom, Everett is tasked with stealing the contents of an Orangina truck. Everett calls in his friends RUBY and JOLAYNE to help him out of the jam.

Richy reluctantly comes up with a plan to steal a truck in order to sell it off and put the money toward paying Terry back. Of course, it doesn’t go as planned and they end up with the truck that Ruby and Jolayne were supposed to steal – and vice versa. Stuck with a truck load of sugar and coffee creamer, the boys are forced to double their efforts to find Sheldon. Worse, it turns out the merchandise is actually a shipment of cocaine belonging to a vicious drug dealer named GEORGE (Til Schweiger).

Efforts to persuade Sheldon to give up either the coin or the loot proves fruitless, so VJ enlists the help of a beautiful scam artist named CHLOE.  She approaches Sheldon, hoping to seduce him so that she can swipe the coin. But Sheldon is not interested...in women. Richy convinces VJ to play the part of seductress, so to speak. VJ’s attempt to steal the coin goes from bad to worse when Tony and Nicky arrive and start shooting the place up. VJ barely escapes alive while Tony and Nicky chase Sheldon through the streets before he too escapes.

The series of mix-ups and double crosses culminates with Richy finally figuring out a way to pit the various criminal elements against each other. It will take finesse, luck, and brains, and for this crew, finesse, luck, and brains are in short supply. “Sleight of Hand” is a hilarious action-packed adventure with a star-studded cast.