Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps
MA
When Gordon Gekko first exploded onto our screens in 1987 it was the era of corporate expense accounts, the real estate boom and conspicuous consumption. Greed was "good", if you could afford it.
It has continued to be "good" for many people since, yet the 2008 global financial crisis "” with worldwide bank collapses, subprime housing disasters and leveraged debt "” prompted a radical rethink.
It's into this highly charged atmosphere that Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) reappears, leaving prison in 2001 after serving eight years for insider trading. He reclaims his personal effects, from the gold money clip to the 1980s mobile phone, but tellingly there's no-one to meet him at the prison gate with his outdated technology and empty assets.
Fast-forward to 2008 and the financial world is teetering on the brink. Gekko's daughter Winnie (Carey Mulligan) is a writer for a news website, estranged from her father but in a happy relationship with Jake (Shia LaBeouf), a smart Wall Street trader who's excited by money but even more excited about the possibilities in alternative energy.
When rumours result in the ferocious takeover of the investment house where Jake works, his boss and mentor, Lou (Frank Langella), throws himself under a train. Jake then attends a lecture given by Gekko to promote his book (amusingly titled Is Greed Good?) and the two form an alliance "” Gekko because he wants to reconcile with Winnie and Jake because he knows Gekko could help unravel the threads that led to Lou's suicide.
Gekko is now preaching about the evils in the markets "” "I used to say greed is good: now it seems it's legal" "” and warning it's all about to go to hell in a handbasket. He's right, of course. And you know the GFC is coming, like an economic tsunami, ready to sweep all before it. But when it does arrive in the midst of the characters' personal, financial and business struggles, it's almost a surprise.
As the Dow plummets with no end in sight, you sit back to see how the characters will respond. Will Jake be able to change his money-making mindset? Will his mother Sylvia (Susan Sarandon) recognise her real estate dream is unsustainable and be prudent? And what about the big Wall Street names who have made reputations and billions on the back of other people's losses? Most particularly, you wonder about Gordon Gekko: his motives and whether he really has reformed. Winnie, fearful of a repeat of the past, warns Jake he will only hurt them.
Then there's the money itself, spoken about in terms and amounts that are laughable to most of us. Jake is able to help his mother to the tune of $200,000 before the GFC hits, and the bonus he receives early on from Lou would keep an average family for decades. No wonder the Wall Street life is so alluring.
The message of director Oliver Stone seems to be that greed isn't good… but having money is great. That being too dependent on money isn't good… but wanting more of it is really only greed if you break the law. Contentment doesn't rate highly here. Even Jake, who works hard to arrange research funding for an alternative energy project, is still seduced by the promise of making more to have more.
Truthfully, most of us aren't that great at contentment, either. As James the brother of Jesus noted, we want to spend what we get on our pleasures. Winnie is the film's only major character that doesn't pursue money for its own sake. She has seen the damage it can do.
With its tight script, great soundtrack and some powerful performances, there is much to enjoy in this film. But, as Gekko says, "Money is a bitch that never sleeps". and we would do well to be wary and wise in her presence.
