An Honest LiarMovies like An Honest Liar
- Key Features:
- Skepticism, Deception, Social commentary, Expose, Magic, Cult of personality, LGBTQ+, Investigation, Charismatic protagonist, Conspiracy, Scandal, Biopic, Cult classic
- Tone:
- serious, suspense-driven, earnest
- Target Audience:
- Documentary enthusiasts, Skeptics, Truth-seekers, Socially conscious
- Emotional Arc:
- Intrigue → Revelation
An Honest Liar

An Honest Liar tells the incredible story of the world-famous magician, escape artist, and world-renowned enemy of deception, James 'The Amazing' Randi. The film brings to life Randi's intricate investigations that publicly exposed psychics, faith healers, and con-artists with quasi-religious fervor. A master deceiver who came out of the closet at the age of 81, Randi created fictional characters, fake psychics, and even turned his partner of 25 years, Jose Alvarez, into a sham guru named Carlos.
An Honest Liar
Documentary exploring the human tendency to be dishonest. Inspired by the work of social scientist, Dan Ariely, the film interweaves personal stories, expert opinions, behavioral experiments, and archival footage to reveal how and why people lie.

Career con man Roy sets his sights on his latest mark: recently widowed Betty, worth millions. And he means to take it all. But as the two draw closer, what should have been another simple swindle takes on the ultimate stakes.

By the early 1900s, the extraordinary Houdini earned an international reputation for his theatrical tricks and daring feats of extrication from shackles, ropes, handcuffs and... Scotland Yard's jails.

Forced by his son's birthday wish, fast-talking attorney and habitual liar Fletcher Reede must tell the truth for the next 24 hours.

Set in a world where the concept of lying doesn't exist, a loser changes his lot when he invents lying and uses it to get ahead.

In 2009, Alex Gibney was hired to make a film about Lance Armstrong’s comeback to cycling. The project was shelved when the doping scandal erupted, and re-opened after Armstrong’s confession. The Armstrong Lie picks up in 2013 and presents a riveting, insider's view of the unraveling of one of the most extraordinary stories in the history of sports. As Lance Armstrong says himself, “I didn’t live a lot of lies, but I lived one big one.”

I AM is an utterly engaging and entertaining non-fiction film that poses two practical and provocative questions: what’s wrong with our world, and what can we do to make it better? The filmmaker behind the inquiry is Tom Shadyac, one of Hollywood’s leading comedy practitioners and the creative force behind such blockbusters as “Ace Ventura,” “Liar Liar,” “The Nutty Professor,” and “Bruce Almighty.” However, in I AM, Shadyac steps in front of the camera to recount what happened to him after a cycling accident left him incapacitated, possibly for good. Though he ultimately recovered, he emerged with a new sense of purpose, determined to share his own awakening to his prior life of excess and greed, and to investigate how he as an individual, and we as a race, could improve the way we live and walk in the world.

After breaking up with his longtime stage partner, a famous but jaded Vegas magician fights for relevance when a new, "hip" street magician appears on the scene.

Storyteller and Conceptual Magician Derek DelGaudio attempts to understand the illusory nature of identity and answer the deceptively simple question 'Who am I?'

A fearless, globe-trotting, terrorist-battling secret agent has his life turned upside down when he discovers his wife might be having an affair with a used car salesman while terrorists smuggle nuclear war heads into the United States.

A look behind the scenes at Bernie Madoff's massive Ponzi scheme, how it was perpetrated on the public and the trail of destruction it left in its wake, both for the victims and Madoff's family.

Documents the lives of infamous fakers Elmyr de Hory and Clifford Irving. De Hory, who later committed suicide to avoid more prison time, made his name by selling forged works of art by painters like Picasso and Matisse. Irving was infamous for writing a fake autobiography of Howard Hughes. Welles moves between documentary and fiction as he examines the fundamental elements of fraud and the people who commit fraud at the expense of others.

Hoping to leave his criminal lifestyle behind him, a successful art thief teams up with a sexy con woman to pull off the ultimate heist and set himself free.

John Cleese, Michael Palin, Terry Jones and Terry Gilliam pay tribute to their late Monty Python colleague Graham Chapman in this hilarious, 3-D animated adaptation of Chapman's brazenly fictionalized life story.

Jerome, 35, is a yacht salesman in Nice. But if you listen to him, in his spare time Jerome is also an astronaut, a karate world champion and a close friend of Miss Universe. As a matter of fact Jerome is a compulsive liar: he lies to everyone about everything! No one believes him, but that doesn’t prevent him from accumulating more lies. But one day Jerome wakes up to find out that all his lies have come true... and it’s just the beginning of the troubles ...!

In the darkly phantasmagorical world of the carnival magician and sideshow hypnotist, the gruesome "illusions" of Montag the Magnificent are unique in that they seem to become retroactive reality long after the the tricks are done. Is it coincidence, or circumstantial evidence of the world's most diabolically ingenious murders? When an underground journalist begins to investigate the strange deaths, the truth proves to be far more bizarre and disturbing than anything he or his readers might have imagined.

A professional lady con makes herself the pharmacist's fiancée overnight, and faces a disastrous blemish in her impeccable con-woman career.

An ex-major forces a scientist to develop a invisibility formula, with which he plans to create an invisible army and sell it to the highest bidder. However there are side effects to the formula.

David Blaine's signature brand of street magic mystifies the most recognisable celebrities in the world, such as Jamie Foxx, Bryan Cranston, Aaron Paul, Ricky Gervais, Katy Perry, Woody Allen, and Robert DeNiro, to name a few. He goes to the homes of Kanye West and Harrison Ford, Will Smith and Olivia Wilde. He pays a visit to Stephen Hawking at his office in Cambridge University. Blaine also travels the world, astonishing people from all walks of life with never-before seen, inconceivable magic.

An attention-seeking psychic is kidnapped and tries to use the situation to boost his popularity.

Con man Ray Elliot decides to leave crime behind to start a company that sells fake alibis to clients who have been unfaithful to their significant others. It seems that the streetwise Ray has found his calling, until he unexpectedly becomes a murder suspect in a case involving one of his most influential customers. Now, as the police and an assassin called "The Mormon" track Ray, he and his attractive assistant, Lola, must clear their own names.

Albert Einstein helps a young man who's in love with Einstein's niece to catch her attention by pretending temporarily to be a great physicist.

Pressured by a greedy uncle and a pile of debt, lovable loser Steve Barker resorts to an unthinkable, contemptible, just-crazy-enough-to-work scheme. He pretends to be mentally challenged to rig the upcoming Special Olympics and bring home the gold. But when Steve's fellow competitors get wise to the con, they inspire him to rise to the greatest challenge of all: becoming a better person.

When three childhood best friends pull a prank gone wrong, they invent the imaginary Ricky Stanicky to get them out of trouble. Twenty years later, the trio still uses the nonexistent Ricky as a handy alibi for their immature behavior. But when their spouses and partners get suspicious and demand to finally meet the fabled Mr. Stanicky, the guilty trio decide to hire a washed-up actor and raunchy celebrity impersonator to bring him to life.

With his eye on a lovely aristocrat, a gifted illusionist named Eisenheim uses his powers to win her away from her betrothed, a crown prince. But Eisenheim's scheme creates tumult within the monarchy and ignites the suspicion of a dogged inspector.

After one of his class papers is stolen and turned into a movie, a young student and his best friend exact a hilarious, slapstick revenge on the Hollywood hot shot who has taken credit!

A young woman named Savannah Knoop spends six years pretending to be a transgender writer named JT Leroy, the made-up literary persona of her sister-in-law.

A cameraman is knocked over during a football game. His brother-in-law, as the king of the ambulance-chasing lawyers, starts a suit while he's still knocked out. The cameraman is against it until he hears that his ex-wife will be coming to see him. He pretends to be injured to get her back, but also sees what the strain is doing to the football player who injured him.

A true story about Frank Abagnale Jr. who, before his 19th birthday, successfully conned millions of dollars worth of checks as a Pan Am pilot, doctor, and legal prosecutor. An FBI agent makes it his mission to put him behind bars. But Frank not only eludes capture, he revels in the pursuit.

An insurance salesman begins to suspect that his whole life is actually some sort of reality TV show.

Two con artists hire an unwitting medical-school student as a secretary for their latest scam.

After closing his agency Alibi.com and promising Flo that he would never lie to her again, Greg's new life became quiet, too quiet... Not for long! When he decides to propose to Flo, Greg is up against the wall and has to introduce his family. But with his crooked father and his ex-charm actress mother, this could ruin his future union. He has no choice but to reopen his agency with his former accomplices for an ultimate Alibi and to find more presentable fake parents.

When ordinary boy Davis suddenly becomes famous at school as people start to believe he's actually a vampire, vampire expert Cameron helps him act like a real vampire.

The true story of fraudulent Washington, D.C. journalist Stephen Glass, who rose to meteoric heights as a young writer in his 20s, becoming a staff writer at The New Republic for three years. Looking for a short cut to fame, Glass concocted sources, quotes and even entire stories, but his deception did not go unnoticed forever, and eventually, his world came crumbling down.

With a magical new invention that promised to revolutionize blood testing, Elizabeth Holmes became the world’s youngest self-made billionaire, heralded as the next Steve Jobs. Then, overnight, her 10-billion-dollar company dissolved. The rise and fall of Theranos is a window into the psychology of fraud.

In 1944 Poland, a Jewish shop keeper named Jakob is summoned to ghetto headquarters after being caught out after curfew. While waiting for the German Kommondant, Jakob overhears a German radio broadcast about Russian troop movements. Returned to the ghetto, the shopkeeper shares his information with a friend and then rumors fly that there is a secret radio within the ghetto.

Offbeat documentarian Chris Smith provides a behind-the-scenes look at how Jim Carrey adopted the persona of idiosyncratic comedian Andy Kaufman on the set of Man on the Moon.

Refined actress Lauren Ames finally has a chance to study with the great theatre professor Stanislav Korzenowski. Sandy Brozinsky, a brash, loud actress, decides through happenstance to also study with Korzenowski. The two women end up dating the same man (who turns out to be a double agent) and follow him across the country to force him to choose between them.

The life and career of the hailed Hollywood movie star and underappreciated genius inventor, Hedy Lamarr.

Illusionist Derren Brown concocts a psychological experiment in which he tries to manipulate an ordinary person into taking a bullet for a stranger.

Failed magician Iskender decides to do a tour to save his career, but has to bring his grumpy and senile father along. The tour is quite unexpectedly interrupted when a bride actually disappears from the stage.

An ex-office worker becomes a ventriloquist, leading to a date with his unemployment counselor; but his quirky family and a gauche female friend may thwart his new career and love life.

After a publisher changes a writer's debut novel about a deadly assassin from fiction to nonfiction, the author finds himself thrust into the world of his lead character, and must take on the role of his character for his own survival.

A former idealistic leader turned corrupt politician is cursed by his grandmother on the eve of the presidential election, forcing him to be honest. Can he win without lies and what will be the conditions?

Recently orphaned, a young boy is taken in by his godmother who is shocked to realize that she can see the boy's imaginary friend: a flamboyant, French magician named Bogus.

Maynard, a beloved local businessman is mistaken for the legendary Bigfoot during an inebriated romp through town in a makeshift gorilla costume. The sightings set off an international Bigfoot media spectacle and a windfall of tourism dollars for a simple American town hit by hard times. When Brock Masterson, reality TV’s “Monster Hunter,” arrives to hunt the beast, Maynard agonizes over whether to come clean, destroying the rebirth of his beloved town, or perpetuate the inadvertent hoax.

Jonas Nightengale is a fraudulent Christian faith healer who makes a living travelling around America holding revival meetings and conducting 'miracles' with the help of his friend and manager, Jane, and their entourage.

A chronicle of the crimes of Ted Bundy, from the perspective of his longtime girlfriend, Elizabeth Kloepfer, who refused to believe the truth about him for years.

After years of putting her career ahead of love, stand-up comic Andrea Singer has stumbled upon the perfect guy. On paper, he checks all the boxes, but is he everything he appears to be?

Matt Walsh goes deep undercover in the world of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Prepare to be shocked by how far race hustlers will go and how much further Matt Walsh will go to expose the grift, uncovering absurdities that will leave you laughing.

João Ernesto Ribamar is a corrupt politician running for the presidency. He is in the runoff election, ahead on the polls, when he receives a "mandinga" (curse) from his grandmother, which makes him unable to lie. Now the problem begins: How to win an election by telling only the truth?

A French illusionist travels to Scotland to work. He meets a young woman in a small village. Their ensuing adventure in Edinburgh changes both their lives forever.

After a freak accident, an invisible yuppie runs for his life from a treacherous CIA official while trying to cope with his new life.

Set within music field, this film depicts a love story between a 25-year-old sound engineer and 16-year-old high school student Riko, who posessess a gifted voice. 25-year-old sound engineer Aki is a member of popular band "Crude Play," but right after the band decides to make their major record debut Aki quits the band. But, Aki provides his music to Crude Play under the name of producer Soichiro. Aki begins to date Riko, whose father runs a fruit and vegetable shop. Riko doesn't know about Aki's background, but she likes to listen to him hum. Riko is in a band herself, with childhood friend Yuichi and Sota. One day she is scouted by producer Soichiro.

Mike Tyson's one-man show is a fascinating journey into his storied life and career. MIKE TYSON: UNDISPUTED TRUTH is a rare, personal look inside the life and mind of one of the most feared men ever to wear the heavyweight crown. Directed by Academy Award® nominee Spike Lee, this riveting one-man show goes beyond the headlines, behind the scenes and between the lines to deliver a must-see theatrical knockout.

Jobless loner Eddie Vuibert gets a lucky break when a rich Jewish entrepreneur mistakes him for a Jew and gives him a sweet job in the Parisian fashion district.

An FBI agent and an Interpol detective track a team of illusionists who pull off bank heists during their performances and reward their audiences with the money.

Nicky, an accomplished con artist, gets romantically involved with his disciple Jess but later ends their relationship. Years later, she returns as a femme fatale to spoil his plans.

The true story of a man who posed as director Stanley Kubrick during the production of Kubrick's last film, Eyes Wide Shut, despite knowing very little about his work and looking nothing like him.

A handyman living in New York City is mistaken for a famous and famously reclusive writer and brought to a university where he is to deliver a keynote address.

Oscar Diggs, a small-time circus illusionist and con-artist, is whisked from Kansas to the Land of Oz where the inhabitants assume he's the great wizard of prophecy, there to save Oz from the clutches of evil.

After serving time for murder, Josh Hutton returns to his home town where he meets Audry Hugo. No one can remember exactly what Josh did...

A bank robber tries to turn himself in because he's falling in love and wants to live an honest life...but when he realizes the Feds are more corrupt than him, he must fight back to clear his name.

Using previously unheard audiotapes recorded shortly after John Belushi’s death, director R.J. Cutler’s documentary feature examines the too-short life of the once-in-a-generation talent who captured the hearts and funny bones of devoted audiences.

A renowned Mexican journalist and documentary filmmaker living in Los Angeles, after being named the recipient of a prestigious international award, is compelled to return to his native country, unaware that this simple trip will push him to an existential limit.

A rising star at agri-industry giant Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Mark Whitacre suddenly turns whistleblower. Even as he exposes his company’s multi-national price-fixing conspiracy to the FBI, Whitacre envisions himself being hailed as a hero of the common man and handed a promotion.

Bounty hunter Bucum Jackson teams with the small-time con artist, Reggie Wright, that he is pursuing, in an attempt to locate a missing stash of diamonds and a lottery ticket worth millions of dollars. Bucum and Reggie find themselves in a race to the finish as they embark on an unlikely partnership that should -- when all is said and done -- prove beneficial to them both.

A drama centered on the relationship between journalist Michael Finkel and Christian Longo, an FBI Most Wanted List murderer who for years lived outside the U.S. under Finkel's name.

Harry Donovan is an art forger who paints fake Rembrandt picture for $500,000. The girl he meets and gets into bed with in Paris, Marieke, turns out to be an arts expert Harry's clients are using to check the counterfeit picture he painted.

Jack Parker has always skated by on his lies, especially the one about Mikey, an underprivileged (and made-up) teen who Jack "tutors"... until one day "Mikey" shows up for real, and all Jack's lies start coming true.

When ordered to serve a year in rehab, actress Candy hires her on-set stand-in to take her place. The unassuming woman flips the script and steals her identity, career and boyfriend in this hilarious comedy about trading places.

Steven Russell leads a seemingly average life – an organ player in the local church, happily married to Debbie, and a member of the local police force. That is until he has a severe car accident that leads him to the ultimate epiphany: he’s gay and he’s going to live life to the fullest – even if he has to break the law to do it. Taking on an extravagant lifestyle, Steven turns to cons and fraud to make ends meet and is eventually sent to the State Penitentiary where he meets the love of his life, a sensitive, soft-spoken man named Phillip Morris. His devotion to freeing Phillip from jail and building the perfect life together prompts him to attempt (and often succeed at) one impossible con after another.

A traveling magician and his assistants are persecuted by authorities in 19th century Sweden. Their capture, however, didn't bring victory to those in power.

In the years after the Revolution, China broken up into fiefdoms held by warlords, who are busy fighting each other. One warlord has imprisoned a girl and wants her to be his seventh wife, but he's too honorable to force her. The local revolutionaries wants to kill him and bring back the republic. But when a stranger returns from abroad with mastery of magic to recover the girl he loved, who is tricking whom and who will win at the end?

What Jake Vig doesn't know just might get him killed. A sharp and polished grifter, Jake has just swindled thousands of dollars from the unsuspecting Lionel Dolby with the help of his crew. It becomes clear that Lionel wasn't just any mark, he was an accountant for eccentric crime boss Winston King. Jake and his crew will have to stay one step ahead of both the criminals and the cops to finally settle their debt.

Two investigators of paranormal hoaxes, the veteran Dr. Margaret Matheson and her young assistant, Tom Buckley, study the most varied metaphysical phenomena with the aim of proving their fraudulent origins. Simon Silver, a legendary blind psychic, reappears after an enigmatic absence of 30 years to become the greatest international challenge to both orthodox science and professional sceptics. Tom starts to develop an intense obsession with Silver, whose magnetism becomes stronger with each new manifestation of inexplicable events. As Tom gets closer to Silver, tension mounts, and his worldview is threatened to its core.

A small-time conman has his loyalties torn between his estranged mother and his new girlfriend, both of whom are high-stakes grifters with their own angles to play.

Sean Reynolds, a highly acclaimed investigative journalist (who strongly believed in paranormal phenomena), destroyed his career when the most watched episode of his reality show, based on paranormal phenomena, turned out to be a hoax. Sean saw a news report on a "Bigfoot Hunter" (Carl Drybeck) who claimed to possess the body of a dead Sasquatch. He believes Drybeck is a phony and decides to create a new show that reveals people's paranormal claims as hoaxes. Sean assembles his old film crew and heads to Northern California's "Lost Coast" to meet with and interview Drybeck. Obsessed, Sean is staking his comeback, his life and the lives of his documentary film crew on proving Drybeck's claim to be a hoax.

A young Englishman dreams of escaping from his working class family and dead-end job as an undertaker's assistant. A number of indiscretions cause him to lie in order to avoid the penalties. His life turns into a mess and he has an opportunity to run away and leave it all behind.

Paul Morse is a good guy. When his friends throw him a wild bachelor party, he just wants to keep his conscience clean -- which is why he's shocked when he wakes up in bed with a beautiful girl named Becky and can't remember the night before. Desperate to keep his fiancée, Karen, from finding out what may or may not be the truth, he tells her a teensy lie. Soon his lies are spiraling out of control and his life is a series of comical misunderstandings.

Scientists Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss travel the globe promoting a scientific worldview and the rational questioning of religious belief.

Twelve-year old Theo plays for a local soccer club and has enough talent to eventually go pro. But his father has been on a self-destructive spiral ever since he started drinking and got divorced, and Theo feels powerless and anxious as he watches his dad slowly destroying his own life. But he refuses to give up on him. When a recruiter for a prestigious British club takes notice of him, Theo sees an opportunity to rekindle his father’s hope, but despite all his efforts he is not selected. So he decides to lie and say he was, hoping to make his father happy and proud. Theo’s dad is so overjoyed that he puts all his heart into helping his son prepare for “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” gradually regaining his taste for life and motivation for the future. Until the lie reaches unforeseen proportions and completely spins out of control. Thankfully, Theo’s little lie has already operated big change and generated so much hope, that life is able to get back on track. Only better!

A pair of rivaling stage magicians are forced to confront their falling out over a guillotine mishap when they compete in a magic competition.

A naive business graduate is installed as president of a manufacturing company as part of a stock scam.

The CIA’s hunt is on for the mastermind of a wave of terrorist attacks. Roger Ferris is the agency’s man on the ground, moving from place to place, scrambling to stay ahead of ever-shifting events. An eye in the sky – a satellite link – watches Ferris. At the other end of that real-time link is the CIA’s Ed Hoffman, strategizing events from thousands of miles away. And as Ferris nears the target, he discovers trust can be just as dangerous as it is necessary for survival.

A conman and his seductive partner are forced to work for a wild FBI agent, who pushes them into a world of Jersey power-brokers and the Mafia.

When Cecilia's abusive ex takes his own life and leaves her his fortune, she suspects his death was a hoax. As a series of coincidences turn lethal, Cecilia works to prove that she is being hunted by someone nobody can see.

Set in the 1920s French Riviera, a master magician is commissioned to try and expose a psychic as a fraud.

Interviews with leading authors, philosophers and scientists, with an in-depth discussion of the Law of Attraction. The audience is shown how they can learn and use 'The Secret' in their everyday lives.

Posing as a wealthy, jet-setting diamond mogul, an Israeli conman wooed women online then conned them out of millions of dollars. Now some victims plan for payback.

A fading actor best known for his portrayal of a popular superhero attempts to mount a comeback by appearing in a Broadway play. As opening night approaches, his attempts to become more altruistic, rebuild his career, and reconnect with friends and family prove more difficult than expected.

Spin doctors spread misinformation and confusion among American citizens to delay progress on such important issues as global climate change.

A talk show hostess and her boyfriend investigate a shady magician who has the ability to hypnotize and control people's thoughts in order to stage gory onstage illusions using his powers of mindbending.

On a tour of Britain in 1926, Harry Houdini enters into a passionate affair with a psychic out to con the famous magician.

When a bestselling celebrity biographer is no longer able to get published because she has fallen out of step with current tastes, she turns her art form to deception.

As part of a drunken bet with her sister Felicity, happily married Alice sends an anonymous Valentine's card to her husband Sam to see if he hides it. When he does, what was a prank leads to a series of events and revelations that may put her marriage at risk, and leaves her looking for answers.

Based on the autobiographical novel, the tempestuous 6-year relationship between Liberace and his (much younger) lover, Scott Thorson, is recounted.


