Wall Street : Money Never Sleeps

Nearly 2 decades back, Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) proudly proclaimed, “Greed is good”. After spending 8 years in prison for various crimes including insider trading, he comes out of jail to the coldest possible reception. Every other inmate who is released with him has someone or the other to receive him. He takes a step towards a black limousine which pulls up only to find out that it was meant for someone else. Left with no choice, he gets into a plain city cab to make his way back into New York and start rebuilding his life. 7 years further down, he is now a successful professor / lecturer and author of a best seller titled – no points for guessing – GREED IS GOOD. He makes his living by encouraging the audience to keep in mind just 3 words which are the secret to getting rich – READ MY BOOK .

Jacob "Jake" Moore (Shia Lebouf) is a successful trader at a well known financial services firm called Keller Zebel investments. He strongly believes in the power of alternate energy options such as fusion and has been pushing the board to invest their monies behind it but not so successfully yet. He is seeing Winnie (Carey Mulligan) who doesn’t really believe in marriage thanks to her parents who she doesn’t hold in high regard. Did I mention Winnie’s last name was Gekko? Jake is in complete awe and respect for his mentor, Lewis Zebel (Frank Langella) who heads up Keller Zebel and considers Jake to be his protégé. So much that he gives him a bonus of $1.5 million and pushes him to get married soon. Jake senses that there is something wrong but Zebel doesn’t reveal much. He hears some rumours about KZ going under but brushes them off. Even Lewis stalls him and doesn’t reveal much but says, “The question is not whether KZ is going under. The question should be who is not”?

The next day, Keller Zebel crashes despite Lewis’ best efforts with the chairmen of the US Treasury at the Federal Reserve, thanks to Bretton James (Josh Brolin) effectively blocking him out. James offers Lewis a best price of $3 per share agains the $75 peak that it was trading at a week before. Not able to handle to crash, Lewis kills himself by jumping in front of a train. A shattered by calm Jake decides to get to the bottom of the entire incident by joining hands with the master himself. He gets into a deal with Gekko wherein Gekko will help him get to the bottom of the Lewis Zebel suicide and why KZ failed. In return, Jake would help him get closer to his daughter who otherwise would have nothing to do with him.

Wall Street Money Never Sleeps once again stamps the authority of on Oliver Stone as a director. Is it his best to date. Not by a country mile. But even an out of form Stone has more class than tons of directors put together. Like most Oliver Stone movies this one too is extremely dialogue intensive and to make it worse for a financially dyslexic moron like me, it was a complete nightmare trying to keep up. But I managed somehow. Knowing Stone, and having watched the first edition, I was kind of prepared for it. Michael Douglas even Josh Brolin are both fascinatingly cruel and cold. Shia LeBouf seems to be making his transition like a Leo DiCaprio did nearly a decade ago from chocolate boy hero to more intense, meaningful roles and is doing a great job out of it as now. But the outstanding performance comes from an actor who I have begun to admire since Frost/Nixon. Frank Langella is simply brilliant in the less than 5 minutes of screen time that he has. His sheer presence makes the screen come alive.

To sign off with a line from Gekko, “I once said that Greed is Good… but now seems it has turned legal”. Definitely an 8 on 10.

Watch the trailer at http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi875627545/