Heartlessed Review: Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps
Twenty-three years have passed, and greed is still good.
Especially, perhaps, with Oliver Stone’s greed. Dude’s last decade has not been good. Alexander bombed; World Trade Center is just like any “hero film” and W. simply dissapoints (by Oliver Stone standard). So he needs some sort of a comeback vehicle. And what can’t be better than a sequel to his famous Wall Street, starring the same guy--Michael Douglas--that made it famous? Even better is: the first one came on the aftermath of the 1987 stock market crash; so it couldn’t be more fitting that its sequel came amongst the biggest global economic crisis since the Great Depression. It’s simply the perfect setting.
And the result...well, it’s satisfactory, to say the least.
After being released from the prison, Gordon Gekko (Douglas) lived a largely peaceful life. That is, until a young man, Jake Moore (Shia LeBouf), approached him. Jake is engaged to Gekko’s enstranged daughter Winnie (Carey Mulligan), and works as a stock broker for a firm than many said is a fictional version of fallen investment bank Lehman Brothers. He has a vendetta against the firm’s hedge fund manager, Bretton James (Josh Brolin), whom he believes is indirectly responsible for the death of his mentor, Louis Zabel (Frank Langella). Coincidently, Gekko helds some grudge against James, too; so the two struck a deal: Gekko will help Moore deal with James, and Moore will help Gekko reconciling with Winnie.
Oh dear, that’s a lousy synopsis I know. The plot is just quite complicated, it took the film two hours to clear it up. Even after that, I can still hear some old lady sitting behind mummering “What just happened?”
So what happened? Well, on one side there’s this family drama storyline going on. On the other hand, we gets to see how the James, the villain of this film, using sneaky tactics to manipulate the market and enrich himself--just like what many accuses Goldman Sachs did in 2008 (By the way, the Treasury Secretary depicted here DOES look like Hank Paulson. Probably coincidence). So in a sense, it’s a blend-and-mix of Capitalism: A Love Story and Saturday morning soap dramas.
Except it didn’t really mix very well. The reason why the first one is so compelling is that, it ties the family story line close to the financial world one. Bud Fox had to choose between his own father, a traditional union worker, and Gekko, this new, exciting mentor who knows how to be successful fast. The conflict is obvious, and it’s clear whose side Stone is on. These conflicts are less obvious in the sequel. I mean, there isn’t really a big “clash of beliefs” in this film. Gekko is a reformed man, at least appearing to be one; Jake seems to be a capitalist with a conscience, with all his support toward green energy projects, but his moral is still quite murky; Bretton James is just a typical “evil banker”, and although Josh Brolin did a great job, he lacks the Gekko’s complexity from the first film (not to mention he got punished for his wrongdoings, unlike his real-life counterparts). The only character that actually took a clear side is Winnie, a blogger for a liberal website who distrusts Wall-Street just as she distrusts her father. But her relationship with Jake seems to indicate Stone’s idea is that although Wall Street bred some unethical bastards, it can still mix well with Main Street. The results is that although Stone tried to replicate the sharp tone of the first film, it got softened up quite a bit-especially in the end.
Comparing to the financial critique, Stone actually did slightly better on the family drama section. This has to much to do with Michael Douglas, whose performance is just as brilliant, charismatic and complex as 23 years ago. Facing him is Shia Labeouf, who surprisingly hold his ground well as the ambitious and impatient Jake. Josh Brolin washes up his tough guy image for the cunning savvy James, just someone that we’d love to hate. And although he only appeared for a few scenes, Frank Langella’s potrayal of Zabel the desparate banker left a very, very powerful impression.
There are some nostalgic factor in the film, with lots of the elements from the first film, no matter it’s those beautiful birdshots of Mahattan or Charlie Sheen’s cameo, they all brought you back to the golden 80s where opportunities are everywhere. When I was watching the film, I noticed that a great majority of the audience are over 40, all sitting there remembering the good old days. Greed might have lost some fans, but appearntly it’s still good--good entertainment, at least.