This is an unusual take on one of the key issues that caused the financial meltdown in 2008.
The film is an adaptation of the best-selling book by Michael Lewis. He’s the same guy that wrote The Blind Side – a best seller which also became a pretty popular film.
This movie doesn’t have the emotional pull of The Blind Side. Whether that’s a good or bad thing is up to the viewer to decide.
The Big Short is a docudrama about greed on Wall Street, lack of oversight by rating agencies and governmental departments, and a handful of people that figured out the sham that was being perpetrated on the nation.
The movie focuses on the guy (Michael Burry) that first figured out that the numbers and details for bundled mortgage securities being sold in the early to mid-2000s were going to fail. He’s an awkward guy who has poor social skills, but is really good with arcane details, especially numbers. Christian Bale plays Michael Burry, and as usually is the case, he really nails the role of his character.
Burry decides to bet against the securities (to go short on them), but there’s no way to do so when he approaches brokerage banks. However, the Wall Street guys are only too happy to create a financial mechanism to accommodate Burry, especially when he’s spending millions on the mechanisms, (plus they are convinced that the mechanisms are guaranteed winners for them).
The movie also focuses on a Wall Street banker, Jared Vennett (played by Ryan Gosling). Vennett learns of the plays that Burry makes, and tries to make money by selling the same mechanisms. He gets rejected by most people that he approaches, but he isn’t dismissed by Mark Baum (played by Steve Carrell), who heads a fund. Baum is suspicious of everything by nature. How his wife (played by Marisa Tomei, who always looks good) puts up with him is hard to figure. However, Baum’s suspicion leads him to do extensive research, and he eventually spends millions buying the financial mechanisms, as he too comes to believe that the bundled mortgage securities are poised to implode.
You’d expect a docudrama about a subject like the international financial crises of 2008 to be pretty serious. To some extent this film is. However, the movie has to educate the audience about a good number of financial things for it to make any sense. The screenwriters came up with a rather interesting way of doing so, where they used comedy to provide this information. It provides some levity to a subject, and a story, that is both serious and sad.
For those into accuracy, I should note that Michael Burry is the only real-life person in the film. The other characters are loosely based on people in Lewis's book, but not real-life people that were a part of the financial crisis.
The movie is a challenge to rate. It’s entertaining, but it also leaves you somewhat angry and somewhat stunned at what took place. This is not a feel-good story, and not even the good guys, so to speak, seem proud of what they accomplished. I found it rather informative, and the performances by Bales and Carrell were excellent. I’m not usually a fan of Ryan Gosling, but he does a very good job in the movie. Brad Pitts has a semi-small roll in the film, and I didn’t even notice he was in the film until I saw the credits.
I’d give it a 3.25 – 3.5 out of 4 stars, and recommend it as such, with the caveats listed in the previous paragraph.
The film is an adaptation of the best-selling book by Michael Lewis. He’s the same guy that wrote The Blind Side – a best seller which also became a pretty popular film.
This movie doesn’t have the emotional pull of The Blind Side. Whether that’s a good or bad thing is up to the viewer to decide.
The Big Short is a docudrama about greed on Wall Street, lack of oversight by rating agencies and governmental departments, and a handful of people that figured out the sham that was being perpetrated on the nation.
The movie focuses on the guy (Michael Burry) that first figured out that the numbers and details for bundled mortgage securities being sold in the early to mid-2000s were going to fail. He’s an awkward guy who has poor social skills, but is really good with arcane details, especially numbers. Christian Bale plays Michael Burry, and as usually is the case, he really nails the role of his character.
Burry decides to bet against the securities (to go short on them), but there’s no way to do so when he approaches brokerage banks. However, the Wall Street guys are only too happy to create a financial mechanism to accommodate Burry, especially when he’s spending millions on the mechanisms, (plus they are convinced that the mechanisms are guaranteed winners for them).
The movie also focuses on a Wall Street banker, Jared Vennett (played by Ryan Gosling). Vennett learns of the plays that Burry makes, and tries to make money by selling the same mechanisms. He gets rejected by most people that he approaches, but he isn’t dismissed by Mark Baum (played by Steve Carrell), who heads a fund. Baum is suspicious of everything by nature. How his wife (played by Marisa Tomei, who always looks good) puts up with him is hard to figure. However, Baum’s suspicion leads him to do extensive research, and he eventually spends millions buying the financial mechanisms, as he too comes to believe that the bundled mortgage securities are poised to implode.
You’d expect a docudrama about a subject like the international financial crises of 2008 to be pretty serious. To some extent this film is. However, the movie has to educate the audience about a good number of financial things for it to make any sense. The screenwriters came up with a rather interesting way of doing so, where they used comedy to provide this information. It provides some levity to a subject, and a story, that is both serious and sad.
For those into accuracy, I should note that Michael Burry is the only real-life person in the film. The other characters are loosely based on people in Lewis's book, but not real-life people that were a part of the financial crisis.
The movie is a challenge to rate. It’s entertaining, but it also leaves you somewhat angry and somewhat stunned at what took place. This is not a feel-good story, and not even the good guys, so to speak, seem proud of what they accomplished. I found it rather informative, and the performances by Bales and Carrell were excellent. I’m not usually a fan of Ryan Gosling, but he does a very good job in the movie. Brad Pitts has a semi-small roll in the film, and I didn’t even notice he was in the film until I saw the credits.
I’d give it a 3.25 – 3.5 out of 4 stars, and recommend it as such, with the caveats listed in the previous paragraph.
