Films > Film Reviews

The Big Short

25/01/16

This comedy drama about the tumbling financial crisis in America seems to gloat with its overblown characters, in your face directing and Family Guy-esque cutaways. Saying that, there is room for this film to succeed with funny moments, an interesting summary by the end of the movie and the pacy nature involved.

The year is 2005 and Michael Burry (Christian Bale) is one of the first people to notice that the build up of the American housing market is very dodgy indeed. His quick thinking catches on with Jared Vennett (Ryan Gosling) who ends up working with Mark Baum (Steve Carell) and his team in tackling this impending disaster.

I don’t know how to really go into the depth of this movie because it’s so bloated with insane blabber about the housing markets, banks, mortgages and the like that even if you know a little about what happened in 2008, you lose track of the dialogue.

The only point where I really sat up and liked the film was in the last 15-20 minutes. This is where the heartbreaking reality and closing facts on the black screen give the most power because it suddenly feels real and not like a cheesy montage of soundbites and arrogant personas. 8 million just in America lost their jobs, which is tragic, and echoes the greedy reality of what happened not long ago.

Adam McKay takes on this biographical movie as if he wants to showboat a new sense of style. He does some interesting things in having a few characters look at the camera and spiel off some facts but that also gets stretched out as does the swiping to celebrities to try and explain financial facts to us.

Overall the characters seem to get lost in the language and chaos of time moving forwards. It’s not an awful film just one which is very smug. Even Margot Robbie in a bubble bath cannot distract me from seeing how baffling and shallow the film comes across.

Steve Carell for me stands out with the most development, his morals becoming clearer. Christian Bale is good as he is in most things but the only interest is because he has a glass eye and doesn’t wear shoes; aside from that and his goodhearted side I don’t see why Bale is up for Supporting Actor. Ryan Gosling smirks his way along in a fun role, helped by a thick coating of fake tan, he stands out as the Jordan Belfort figure.

It’s a movie that feels tonally absurd, vaulting from comedic arrogance to serious truth without notice. The Big Short is certainly sharp in places but besides great editing it doesn’t feel real.

5.5/10