As the summer movie season starts winding down, we’re beginning to get a peek at the awards fare that will be hitting theaters over the next few months, and 2013 is looking very, very promising.  One of the more fascinating films heading our way is director David O. Russell’s follow-up to last year’s Silver Linings Playbook, the real-life drama/comedy American Hustle.  The story is based on an  undercover sting operation called “Abscam”, which was set up in the 1980s by a con artist working for the FBI who rooted out corruption in Congress.  Christian Bale plays the con artist, Amy Adams plays his lover/accomplice, Bradley Cooper plays an FBI agent, and Jennifer Lawrence is set as Bale’s “loose cannon of a Long Island house wife.”  Now the first official images from the pic have landed online, giving us a look at the fantastic ensemble’s early 80s get-up.  Hopefully a trailer is headed our way soon.  This is very much one to look forward to, folks.

Hit the jump to check out the images.  The film also stars Jeremy Renner, Robert De Niro, Louis C.K., Michael Pena, and Jack Huston.  American Hustle opens in limited release on December 13th before going wide on Christmas Day.

Here’s the official synopsis for American Hustle:

A fictional film set in the alluring world of one of the most stunning scandals to rock our nation, American Hustle tells the story of brilliant con man Irving Rosenfeld (Christian Bale), who along with his equally cunning and seductive British partner Sydney Prosser (Amy Adams) is forced to work for a wild FBI agent Richie DiMaso (Bradley Cooper).  DiMaso pushes them into a world of Jersey powerbrokers and mafia that’s as dangerous as it is enchanting.  Jeremy Renner is Carmine Polito, the passionate, volatile, New Jersey political operator caught between the con-artists and Feds. Irving’s unpredictable wife Rosalyn (Jennifer Lawrence) could be the one to pull the thread that brings the entire world crashing down. Like David O. Russell’s previous films, American Hustle defies genre, hinging on raw emotion, and life and death stakes.