Wall Street: Money never sleeps

RATING : ***

The world has come really far in 23 years,when the last Wall Street was released in 1987. Excess was the mantra then,downsizing the mantra now. Even Gordon Gekko knows it.

So when he comes out of jail after eight years (having been put there on,among other charges,“insider trading”),he writes a book Is Greed Still Good? and promotes the same by telling his listeners how he was small fry compared to what the big sharks in the market are doing right now. “I once said greed is good,” he says. “Now,it seems,greed is legal”. “Speculation is the biggest evil,” he goes on,explaining that the economy is resting on one giant bubble that is about to burst.

It’s a nice idea,to have a man who talks of money as a “she,a bitch who lies next to you in bed watching you closely through the night” mock the whole culture that followed from it,while he gained wisdom in the confines of a jail. So,you realise why Stone may have felt the urge to make the first ever sequel to one of his films.

However,does Gekko still have it in him? That’s the thing — Stone doesn’t know. This Gekko may still talk like the Gekko of old,but in the time of meltdown and market crashes,the talk is tempered — sometimes with platitudes for others,at other times with appeals of affection to his estranged daughter. Douglas’s eyes still shine as he thinks green,but the camera moves away too quickly.

The last Wall Street was an insider’s look at the world of high-stakes trading,where morality hardly ever came in the way. This is largely a ringside view of the biggest stock market crisis faced by the world; with Gekko talking about “moral hazards”,while never looking in any danger of suffering from any of them. You get the references,the milestones to that disaster — the Feds and the bailout,Lehman Brothers and Goldman Sachs — from what you have read or heard. Apart from Gekko’s one speech,the film doesn’t really bother to explain.

Shia LaBeouf,otherwise a competent actor,is the biggest casualty of the moral uncertainty that plagues the film. As Jacob,he is an investment banker working for a company that is among the first to go bust from largely bad market moves. The boss that he admires (Langella) commits suicide. He specialises in green energy as it is the future,and is in love with Winnie (Mulligan) who runs a “non-profit” leftist news website and is highly committed to it. Winnie’s last name happens to be Gekko and she hasn’t talked to her dad in years. Jacob,however,is a great admirer of Gordon.

After attending one of his lectures,he introduces himself to Gekko,telling him “I’m about to marry your daughter”,and then starts meeting him for advice and conversation,without telling Winnie. The deal is that Gekko will help Jacob take revenge on the market behemoth Charles Schwartz (supposed to be Goldman Sachs),and Jacob will in turn help him patch up with Winnie.

Mulligan’s share is confined to the tears she sheds; LaBeouf swings from one Gekko to another,and the contrasts in between,while attending to phone calls at random hours from a scientist working on a fusion experiment that apparently will change the world,but who never looks close to doing anything of the sort.

Money Never Sleeps does manage a tight first half,setting up the three-way contest between Gekko,Jacob and Bretton (Brolin),who controls Charles Schwartz and is all black with almost no redeeming grey. But the weak and trailing second leaves you with almost no memory of what transpired before,or the anticipation that it was going somewhere.

Towards the end,the real Wall Street fans could be left wondering which movie they walked into. Money never sleeps,yes. But,importantly,it also doesn’t wait around for a wake-up call.

shalini.langer@expressindia.com