Movie Review: The Big Short
As a massive fan of Gordon Gecko and the Wall Street movie series, I was incredibly excited when I saw The Big Short’s film trailer. Narrating the biggest financial crisis of the decade, The Big Short does well to describe what actually happened in 2008.
Not many of us truly understand why the American property market went bust and how it led to a massive global financial crisis, but this film puts it in lay terms by showing the crisis from the perspective of four men who saw it coming before anyone else. With an all-star cast that includes Christian Bale, Ryan Gosling, Steve Carrell and Brad Pitt, The Big Short is a 2016 must-see.
The first insider is Michael Berry (Bale), a stock-picking genius with a glass eye and poor social skills (worlds away from his cool, handsome Batman gig.) Berry discovers that rolled-gold mortgage bundles contain thousands of bonds on the verge of default, and bets that real estate is no longer a safe investment.
Second is the movie’s narrator, the cocky and foul-mouthed Jarred Vennett played by Ryan Gosling. Vennett eventually jumps on Berry’s wobbly CDOs (Collaterized Debt Obligation) and the instability of the bonds of which they’re comprised.
If you’re starting to feel confused, don’t worry. All through the film, help is at hand as Vennett brings humour to the heavy material through breakout explanations of explaining professional Wall Street jargon. Just wait until you see Margot Robbie breathlessly CDOs and sub-prime bonds while waving her champagne about. At the end you’ll be nodding your head and saying, "Okay… now I get it!”
Steve Carrell plays a serious-yet-still-hilarious role as Mark Baum, a short fused man who is happy when he’s unhappy, suffers a love-hate relationship with his job as an investor and has a small team that exhibit similar characteristics. Baum’s continual struggle with the morality of Wall Street is ongoing and makes him one of the most complex characters of the film. Carrell vacillates Baum’s frustrations with the kind of perfect timing that only a comedian can achieve.
The final two investors are a couple of young bulls from Hicksville; Charles Geller and Jamie Shipley. The excitable and talented boys are backed by ex-Wall Street Broker and new-age pessimist Ben Rickert (Brad Pitt) who is convinced Geller and Shipley have picked up on something via the fragility of the CDOs.
Watching this movie I was overcome with a sense of disbelief at the stupidity of the banks and investors at the time. I couldn’t help but think, “How did they let this happen?” This is the question continually posed by the script through repeated demonstrations of the greed pursued by American banks at the time.
The Big Short allows the audience to experience a range of emotions. Humour, anger and sadness are all there, but finishes with a bitter-sweet victory of four investors who saw the property bubble burst before anyone else.
Rating:
4.5/5
