Big Short, The (3/15/2016)

Rated R for pervasive language and some sexuality/nudity.

Starring Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt

Directed by Adam McKay (Step Brothers and Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy)

This is the best film about the biggest financial disaster of our lifetime.

When four outsiders saw what the big banks, media and government refused to, the global collapse of the economy, they had an idea: The Big Short. Their bold investment leads them into the dark underbelly of modern banking where they must question everyone and everything.

Adam McKay is like that history teacher some of us were lucky enough to have in high school. They made history come alive. Because of them it was fun, interesting and compelling. McKay bends over backwards to make this extremely complex plot understandable. Ryan Gosling serves as one of the main players and the narrator. I loved how he casually breaks the fourth wall, and fills in the blanks.

The rest of the cast is packed with charismatic superstars. Christian Bale is Michael Burry MD, the antisocial hedge fund manager who first sees the issue at the heart of the mortgage market. Soon Steve Carell’s furious Mark Baum and his team take interest, partnering up with Gosling’s wheeler-dealing Jared Vennett. They’re followed by novice investors Jamie Shipley (Finn Wittrock) and Charlie Geller (John Magaro) — who are in turn guided by Brad Pitt’s eccentric Ben Rickert. The film jumps between these three main groups in order to tell the whole story.

I’m not going to dive into the more technical aspects of the film, mostly because I can’t. In fact, McKay knows not everyone is going to follow the details of what is happening on screen so he uses cutaway skits with celebrity cameos like Margot Robbie and Anthony Bourdain to explain to us what we just saw.

This film informs and outrages us without the Michael Moore-style berating…just wish they didn’t throw in so much nudity and so many F-words…so for that reason the score drops to a “Rental.”

SHOULD KIDS SEE IT?
There are a couple scenes in strip clubs. In one of the scenes, the female strippers’ breasts are shown but nipples are covered. In another, there is one stripper whose breasts and nipples are briefly shown. In both scenes, there is plenty of sexual dancing. There are also plenty of F-words and other profanity.

CONVERSATION STARTER:

1. What is the main theme of this film?


2. Why is greed a bad thing?

Read 1 Timothy 6:10

The love of money causes all kinds of trouble. Some people want money so much that they have given up their faith and caused themselves a lot of pain.


3. What pain did the bankers cause?


4. How can we protect ourselves from greed?