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The Big Short (2015)

The Big Short review

written by Souranath Banerjee

“Truth is like poetry. And most people fucking hate poetry.”

My Ratings: 4/5.

Christian Bale,  Steve Carell,  Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt are all in the same movie and if that is not reason enough for you to watch this big-short-poster3film, then I must add that The Big Short is pretty well made too.

With the backdrop of the sudden U.S mortgage crisis in around mid 2000 which eventually dented the entire world economy, the film though particularly focuses on a group of people who noticed and predicted the devastating financial crisis well ahead and even profited from it!

An eccentric loner and fund-manager Dr. Michael Burry (Christian Bale), the smooth and classy trader Jared Vennett (Ryan Gosling), the loud and edgy money-manager Mark Baum (Steve Carell), and the cynical ex-trader Ben Rickert (Brad Pitt) who helped the two big-short-poster2young investors Charlie Gellar and Jamie Shipley (John Magaro and Finn Wittrock) – however unbelievable it may seem, but these are the only few people in the entire world who knew enough to bet against the American economy!

“Tell me the difference between stupid and illegal and I’ll have my wife’s brother arrested.”

Well, this is one of the many funny onelinners by Ryan Gosling but if taken on a serious note, such a fatal housing market calamity and the resulting financial meltdown was only possible because all the major banks at the time in US really didn’t care much about the difference between stupidity and being illegal!

Based on the book with the same name by financial journalist Michael Lewis, co-writer and director Adam McKay has been successful in adding enough humor to dilute the financial jargon and make the film coherent for everybody.

big-short-poster1The cameos of sizzling Margot Robbie and sultry Selena Gomez explaining the difficult parts of finance certainly helps.

Unique editing style by Hank Corwin by juxtaposing popular images and youtube videos/music videos of the time along with the parallel storytelling of each individual character.

The Big Short does makes us remember Martin Scorsese‘s recent feature ‘The Wolf of Wall Street‘, not only due to the fact that it was also a movie related to wall-street/banking/finance but specially because of the often deliberate ‘breaking of the Fourth Wall’ by many characters throughout the film.

Overall an entertainer that demands your patience.

Poster courtesy: www.impawards.comwww.comingsoon.net

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