Writer/director Adam McKay (Anchorman) joins forces with Paramount Pictures and Plan B Entertainment to adapt Michael Lewis’ best-seller The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, which centers on the housing a credit bubble of the 2000s.
[Jim’s Review] [Kenny’s Review]
As a modern movie focused on the seedy side of high gloss finance, The Big Short is “bro-y” like Boiler Room with a frenetic, tautly edited energy of Wolf of Wall Street. The Big Short explains the lead up to the financial crisis in the context of a dense, mainstream comedy. From concept to execution, there is a lot to respect in this movie that it sweeps away audiences.
The strongest element of The Big Short is the wily screenplay which does everything from enhance comedic moments, insert sly one-liners, and simplifies complex financial theories and processes for ordinary audiences to understand. With pop culture references, detailed narration, and random scenes, there is a lot happening. This screenplay is asking for viewers to watch the movie over again.
There is great cluster of scenes that define The Big Short. A real estate agent drives the investors through a very wealthy neighborhood commenting on the economic reality of the owners. This is followed by a house party with bragging real estate agents who admit to unethical behavior at a rather gloating level. The next scene, features a stripper explaining to multiple houses she owns as she performs for Carrell. Finally, the main protagonist puts together their is a housing bubble. This was a highlight of the movie and telling to the overall crisis.
themovieblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/bigshort-1.jpg 640w" alt="bigshort" width="530" height="298" />From the big performances to smaller roles, the energetic acting ensemble in The Big Short is impressive and admirable. Christian Bale was mesmerizing and has the best material to work with here. He excels reminding audiences just why this Oscar winning actor is fantastic. Gosling was a little one note, but wasn’t given much to do. Like last year’s Foxcatcher, Steve Carrell tries something outside of his range and Brad Pitt is rather coy compared to his star persona.
The conclusion of The Big Short is enraging for the cool kids. It oozes with cynicism during the season of sentimental moments. It is frustrating that we haven’t learned the lessons from the 2008 economic collapse. This populist bent for higher minded people, The Big Short reminded me of a cross between my two favorite 2009 movies which are the satire In The Loop and the drama Up In The Air.
Credit director Adam McKray for pulling this all together in The Big Short. Comparing his filmmaker resume which were low brow Will Ferrell comedies, Mr. McKray goes from sophomoric to sophisticated with a vibe that is something out of David O Russell for economic junkies. This could be a turning point in his career where an industry will begin to trust him with more complex screenplays.
Audiences have a lot of options this Holiday Season with movies. I think The Big Short is the best wide release for the season. The Big Short will keep the minds active of people who read Inc.com and browse LinkedIn during the numbing days of food and family that are The Holidays. Find this one and have a good time. I loved it.
themovieblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/271345-768x1198.jpg 768w, themovieblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/271345-656x1024.jpg 656w, themovieblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/271345.jpg 800w" alt="Genre: Biography | Drama Directed by: Adam McKay Starring: Christian Bale, Ryan Gosling, Steve Carell, Brad Pitt Written by: Adam McKay, Charles Randolph (screenplay), Michael Lewis (book)" width="350" height="546" />Directed by: Adam McKay
Starring: Christian Bale, Ryan Gosling, Steve Carell, Brad Pitt
Written by: Adam McKay, Charles Randolph (screenplay), Michael Lewis (book)
Synopsis: Four outsiders in the world of high-finance who predicted the credit and housing bubble collapse of the mid-2000s decide to take on the big banks for their lack of foresight and greed. (Imdb)
[Jim’s Review] [Kenny’s Review]
Two years removed from the terrific “The Wolf of Wall Street,” and Adam McKay manages to recreate the same tone and feeling in “The Big Short“. McKay the co-writer and director must have studied a lot of the Scorsese film, as he manages to capture the lead-up and downfall of the 2008 credit and housing bubble collapse the same way as Scorsese did with 1980’s Wall Street.
The film is narrated in first person by Ryan Gosling, which is the same approach used by Leonardo DiCaprio in “The Wolf of Wall Street”. This is a great touch and vital part of the movie as it describes what actually is going on in simple and relatable terms. The guest cameos by real life celebrities explaining what is taking place is a fun added nugget. Margot Robbie sitting in a bathtub explaining the collapse of the economy isn’t the worst thing to see, although a bit distracting. The film’s story focuses on a few people from different walks of the financial world who had predicted the collapse well in advance, but no one took them seriously.
The men at the forefront of these predictions were Dr. Michael Burry (Christian Bale), a loose cannon eccentric number crunching wiz who figured out the data that would lead to the collapse. Mark Baum (Steve Carell) is a sharp and bright hedge fund manager, who hedges his bets on a slick talking trader for Deutsche Bank Jared Vannett (Ryan Gosling). The fourth man that saw the downfall of the market was Ben Rickert (Brad Pitt) a financial guru turned eco-friendly survivalist living a natural overly simplistic lifestyle, who ends up helping out a couple college graduates working out of their garage trying to make it in the financial world. All four of these men were portrayed as misfits in their own way, whether due to their personalities or reputation.
The performances of this star-studded ensemble are terrific all-around, basing their characters on real-life people that were involved in this collapse. Bale is off-the charts as a weird heavy metal crazed financial analyst. With limited screen time he’s dynamic in every scene. The up-and-down emotional roller-coaster he displays is Oscar worthy. Carell is two for two doing astounding work in back-to-back years. A guy who was merely known for being The 40-Year-Old Virgin for years has firmly established himself as one of the premiere leading men in Hollywood, and that’s in drama, not comedy. With his terrific portrayal in “Foxcatcher” as the twistedly creepy Jon du Pont, his character in this film is just as good as an intelligent and savvy, yet emotionally conflicted individual. Gosling does the narration throughout the film, but doesn’t appear until later in it. He carries the film just as much as any individual with his voiceover work. Pitt plays a small supporting role and he’s virtually unrecognizable in character. Grey scruffy beard, clear glasses, shaggy hair, and playing a character who is as odd as he is smart. This is a removal of what Pitt is usually known for. He’s as nerdy as he’s every been in a movie.
themovieblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/3051391-inline-i-1-big-short-movie.jpg 640w" alt="Bale is terrific playing an eccentric analyst" width="594" height="334" />McKay does an excellent job delivering the convoluted data in a understandable and relatable way. The “fourth wall” is broken as Gosling’s character breaks-down the meanings and messages in a humorous way. This is a must-see movie for anyone that wanted to understand what happened to our economy. Unless you are working in the financial world, most wont’ grasp the concepts talked about, and that’s okay because the filmmaker doesn’t expect you to understand the lingo spoken. The collapse isn’t elaborated on as much as the focus is about the lead-up to it. It’s a fascinating story about a few individuals who figured out the system and profited from the collapse. This in turn poses the question if these characters in the film are heroes or villains? There is no clear-cut answer, only a moral opinion. Carell’s character feels sympathy and hurt for the people affected, he even makes a speech at the financial summit in Vegas about the impact on the common folk. I’m sure there was some remorse by the actual men that knew the impact this event would have on everyone’s lives, including the lives of their friends and loved ones.
“The Big Short” is one of the best movies of the year. It deals with a real subject that affected majority of the population and many of the individuals reading this review, including myself. It’s a significant topic that dominated the late 2000’s, and we are still recovering from it as a society. The far ranging impact of this collapse is noted in the movie. People lost jobs, homes, and their lives. It’s scary how so many smart individuals and corporations missed the brewing issues that were facing them. The movie is a commentary on the greed of corporate America, and how regular people always end up loosing at the end. The corporations recover and don’t get the punishment deserved. While “The Wolf of Wall Street” showed the nasty side of stock trading and how people lost money, mostly wealthy people were affected in that case. “The Big Short” is more relatable to the everyday hard working person and it’s presented in a educational, entertaining, and humorous way.
Rating: R
Runtime: 130 minutes
Release Date: December 23, 2015.
