Movie Reaction: The Big Short

Formula: (The Wolf of Wall Street + Wall Street) * A lot of anger

Cast: The foursome of Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt bring a clout to this that is inarguable. This is a huge cast that goes far beyond them. Just a few of the other names I recognized: Marissa Tomei, Hamish Linklater, Max Greenfield, Melissa Leo, Karen Gillan. Then there obvious cameos from people Margot Robbie and Selena Gomez.

Plot: This tracks the housing bubble crash in the mid-2000s from the perspective of the people who saw it coming and bet against it.

Thoughts:
This is the hardest time I've ever had with one of these Reactions. You see, I found this movie funny, easy to watch, and interestingly done, and I pretty strongly disliked it. I can't really talk about this as a good or bad film because I'm not sure I found this artistic. This is an angry essay performed by actors.

It's clear that Adam McKay and Christopher Randolph worked very hard to make this into a script could be followed. The banking industry is a byzantine maze of bullshit, which is kind of the point of the movie: it's a load of bullshit and most people don't even realize the first thing about it. I know I don't. I appreciate the attempt to educate people so that that can be angry at how fucked up it all was. It's clear, crystal clear how pissed off McKay and Randolph are about.

This is a terrific example of a filmmaker getting too precious with an idea. The idea of explaining the housing and credit bubble collapse trumps everything else in the movie. First of all, that's how the movie ends up too long. Second, one of those first rules of writing: show, don't tell is completely ignored. Ryan Gosling's narration ends up being a crutch, used repeatedly for exposition dumps. There's no time to develop and antagonists. Anyone who isn't one of the "protagonists" gets about two lines at most before they say something so completely douchey that there's no mistaking them as anything but a villain.

Then there's the things that are personal pet peeves of mine. I didn't even know a screenplay could be smug, but this one certainly is. This is the story about the few people that saw all this coming and the script, especially Gosling's narration, couldn't be more cocky about that. And, the narration repeatedly stepping on the beats of the story. Stop it! Just let a scene play out. The only reason for chiming in so much is because you are admitting the script isn't tight enough or you don't trust the audience. Either case annoys me.

On the plus side, I finally found the movie this year that's getting Oscar buzz that I'm going to be rooting hard against. There's almost always one. I thought I was getting out of it this year, then this comes in right under the wire.

Elephant in the Room: This sounds like it might be a bit of a political movie. I guess it is. I'm pretty sure the debate about the housing and credit market collapse has more to do with why the banks were able to act like assholes, not if that banks were being assholes. This movie is mostly concerned with how the banks were being assholes, which is certainly something I'm happy to hear about.

To Sum Things Up:
This is a movie more concerned with proving how smart it is than good storytelling. The cast and humor will be enough for most people to enjoy it. 

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend