Four denizens of the world of high-finance predict the credit and
housing bubble collapse of the mid-2000s, and decide to take on the big
banks for their greed and lack of foresight.
Director:
Adam McKayWriters:
Charles Randolph (screenplay), Adam McKay (screenplay)Stars:
Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan GoslingStoryline
Three separate but parallel stories of the U.S mortgage housing crisis
of 2005 are told. Michael Burry, an eccentric ex-physician turned
one-eyed Scion Capital hedge fund manager, has traded traditional office
attire for shorts, bare feet and a Supercuts haircut. He believes that
the US housing market is built on a bubble that will burst within the
next few years. Autonomy within the company allows Burry to do largely
as he pleases, so Burry proceeds to bet against the housing market with
the banks, who are more than happy to accept his proposal for something
that has never happened in American history. The banks believe that
Burry is a crackpot and therefore are confident in that they will win
the deal. Jared Vennett with Deutschebank gets wind of what Burry is
doing and, as an investor believes he too can cash in on Burry's
beliefs. An errant telephone call to FrontPoint Partners gets this
information into the hands of Mark Baum, an idealist who is fed up with
the corruption in the ... Written by
Huggo
User Reviews
Right on the Money and on the Fraud
'The Big Short' is a
winner. Based on Michael Lewis book of the same title, it tells the
sorry story of the fraud and deceit practiced on the American people,
nay, on the world by Wall Streets finance capitalism. We know the
culprits: Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Lehman Bros., Morgan Stanley,
Citibank, Wachovia, Crdit Suisse, UBS and on and on who invented
financial instruments such as CDO, credit swaps and other fancy
unintelligible names, based on mortgages, with the connivance of the
credit agencies--Dow Jone, Standard and Poors and Fitch. 'The Big Short'
with a light seriousness is a crash course on the duplicity of Wall
Street investment bankers who earned large fees on junk bonds with
triple A ratings; who bundled junk to palm off on an unsuspecting public
looking for big gains by pandering to the snake oil exilir of getting
rich quickly; and who feed on the niavety of the broad American
have-nots with the dream of owning a home of their own. And so with some
humor but much sadness are we lead through the byways of four different
groups of bankers who saw the hoax for what it was and its impending
implosion that would bring down the deck of cards of capitalism. And the
took out bets on the market, by buying short. And they won big time!
But the banks are still around, and the ratepayers footed the bailout,
but at what cost! And we see this in the turmoil of the Republican
party: for the discontent abroad in the US has thrown more than 25
percent of the population into poverty, loss of jobs, home, into heavy
debt and no future for their children. And these banks have not reformed
their ways...now they've come up with the same of gimmicks with a fancy
name--something like beneficial financial tranche--as the play the same
old mug's game. And like the Bourbons, t The cast is
stellar--especially Christian Bale and Steve Carell and Ryan Gosling as
well as the minor players. And like the Bourbons, in the words of
Talleyrand, 'they learned nothing and forgot nothing', but the contempt
they have for all of us. And to make the case stronger, the fools on the
Supreme Court have strengthened the hands of big money and the
oligopoly and the fat cats of Wall Street and the coupon clippers and
the devil take the rest of us!
