Ralph's Movie Reviews: WALL STREET: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS

Friday, October 8, 2010

WALL STREET: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS

Drama

PRINCIPAL CAST MEMBERS
Michael Douglas: Gordon Gekko, disgraced former Wall Street corporate raider
Carey Mulligan: his daughter Winnie, creator of the frozentruth.com website
Shia LaBeouf: her live-in boyfriend Jacob “Jake” Moore, a Wall Street trader
Josh Brolin: Bretton James, CEO ??? of Churchill Schwartz Securities
Frank Langella: Jake’s boss Louis Zabel, CEO of Keller Zabel Incorporated
Susan Sarandon: Jake’s real-estate agent mother Sylvia
Eli Wallach: Jules “Julie” Steinhardt, Bretton’s boss ???

REVIEW
Don’t go to see the movie expecting to get a better understanding of the 2008 worldwide financial meltdown or the predatory trading practices that contributed to this crisis since these topics are dealt with at breakneck speed, not in layman terms but that of an Economics major. And keeping track of all the people who keep popping up is next to impossible, especially given that their role is not that well defined to start with. The parallel story line of an estranged daughter trying to deal with her father is equally muddled and rambling.

Once more a film where one person (Oliver Stone) takes on more than 2 key positions (Director, Producer, Writer) has a major shortcoming: in this case the storyline needs rewriting. And it also needs some editing because it goes on far too long at 2 hours plus.

There are some good things to be said about it: the high production values and great acting by Michael Douglas. But apart from that it offers very little of consequence.

CLASSIFICATION

for brief strong language and thematic elements.

FOR NITPICKERS ONLY
• The scroll at the top of the NBC television program showing the Dow Jones average remains unchanged at 10,917 even though in real life at one point in time it dropped below 7,000.
• Gordon and Jake are in the taxi for quite some time before we get to see the meter: it reads $2.90. Given that the drop for a New York cab is $2.50 and increases 40 cents every 1/5 of a mile it should be much higher than that.
• Gordon says he was locked up for 122,000 hours; in fact his incarceration was only 8 years for a total of 68,352 hours.

P.S.
I checked it out and Gordon’s story about Tulipmania actually happened as he described it.

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my ratings system

I've always thought that telling too much about a movie or warning someone about a "twist" at the end deprives the person the pleasure of seeing it as it unfolds, so I don’t do it. You may not always agree with my rating of course, but at least it is an unbiased opinion unlike some of the full time professional reviewers who are on the studio’s payroll.

A few movies you won’t see any review from me:

Scary movies: I’m the world’s biggest chicken and just hate getting the crap scared out of me. I can handle an unexpected door slam, that kind of thing, but a movie that keeps you on the edge of your seat…not for me. Sorry.
Movies geared to the young teen and pre-teen crowd with dialog comprising mostly of crude remarks, awful jokes and lots of rude, socially unacceptable body noises. "The Spy that Shagged Me" comes to mind. (I wonder if the kids know what the British verb to shag someone really means? They probably do; I bet you it’s the parents who haven’t a clue).
Sometimes Hollywood gets on a roll and they produce a series of movies that are all very much alike. For example movies about the CIA were very popular and so we had The Bourne Identity and Bad Company and The Sum of All Fears. They all had the same basic theme and it becomes repetitive. I will see some, but not all of them.

FYI this is my rating system:

0 stars = Terrible: so bad it’s not worth talking about; in fact, I’d pay you not to go
= Lousy: I actually got up and walked out before the end it was just that bad (no kidding)
= Not so good: thought about walking out but hung in just in case it got better (but it didn’t)
= A so-so good movie: I enjoyed it somewhat but wasn’t all that crazy about it
= A really good movie: I recommend seeing it
= An excellent movie you just got to see! I suggest you put it on your "To Do List" it’s that good.

some favourite websites

For those into it, Nitpickers at

has more movie mistakes than you could ever imagine. My contributions can be seen if you check out the Nitpickers Registry and click on the link Nitpickers Listed by Nitpicker Number, select the group 45,401 - 45,500 and drill down to number 45411. Although I have 56 nitpicks to my credit, some have almost 2,000. You wonder sometimes where they find the time to do it.