Emily The Criminal

2022   Roadside Attractions

Rated:  R

Length:  1hr  37 min

Crime ~ Drama ~ Mystery ~ Thriller

Directed by:  John Patton Ford

Starring:  Aubrey Plaza, Theo Rossi, Megalyn Echikunwoke, and Gina Gershon.

“Motherf**kers will just keep taking from you and taking from you until you make the God damn rules yourself. That’s what this is about.”

Aubrey Plaza stars as Emily Benetto, an independent contractor living in Los Angeles delivering for a catering company. She is renting a room in a couple’s house and struggling financially with tens of thousands in student debt. She is trying to lift herself up and find a better job, but is encumbered with an assault conviction and a criminal record thanks to an abusive ex-boyfriend, and is having no luck. Her co-worker Javier turns her on to a side gig where she can make $200 an hour.

Desperate she calls the number and the next day goes to the address they gave her. She meets Youcef (Theo Rossi), who explains that it’s a credit card fraud ring who uses people to perpetrate the fraud purchase in exchange for a hefty fee. Emily hesitates but then, being desperate for some hope of financially getting out of the hole she’s in, agrees and goes to a big box store where she purchases a $2,000 Big Screen Tv with the fake credit card. She then exchanges the tv with the fraud group and gets an envelope with $200 cash inside.

Seems easy enough and Emily digs in deeper for more. Going after bigger and more profitable fraud purchases. Eventually Youcef takes a liking to her, and her eagerness to learn, and sets her up so she can operate on her own. He makes her promise not to visit any one store more than once a week, and if she makes more than $5,000 he gets a cut. She starts having success on her own and gets braver as the money rolls in. But it also exposes her to the unsavory characters in the criminal world and her life gets more dangerous.

Emily’s downward spiral into the criminal world, or her success at achieving financial independence depending on how you look at it, happens at a rapid pace. Emily gets more brazen and ruthless the more dangerous the journey becomes until she is forced to be the victim or the aggressor. After liking Aubrey Plaza last night in Operation Fortune: Ruse De Guerre , I wanted to see more of her and saw she was in this. I am glad I watched it, thought she did an excellent job of portraying Emily and she is now one of my new favorites.

There is an Emily The Criminal TV series in the works being executive produced by Aubrey but she will not star in it.

I thought it was good and definitely recommend it.

Two Thumbs Up!