Sep 25, 2010 13:31 GMT  ·  By
Shia LaBeouf and Michael Douglas come face to face in Oliver Stone’s “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”
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   Shia LaBeouf and Michael Douglas come face to face in Oliver Stone’s “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”

“Greed is good” was the message of the original 1987 “Wall Street” movie that made of Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) the dark angel / antihero / icon of a generation. In this light, greedier is even better would be the motto of the sequel “Money Never Sleeps” – if only the film would realize preaching belongs in the pulpit.

As a rule, Oliver Stone’s films are imbued with a sense of machismo that is as occasionally absurd as it’s fascinating to watch. Thus, “Wall Street 2” too is a film about men and power, and how they go against each other to get it. Then why the need to succumb to cheap sentimentalism and falsely wrought happy-endings, critics ask.

Perhaps knowing his purpose in the original “Wall Street” was defeated when his ultimate, perfectly written and superbly portrayed Gekko became a role model for an entire generation of young stockbrokers, Oliver Stone set out to make of the sequel a lesson in good and evil and how, you know, greed is not really good. It’s evil.

As the film opens, Gekko is walking out of federal prison after serving 8 years for insider trading. He’s outdated, unwelcomed, old – but not broken, even though he may seem so for the better part of the movie.

The place he once occupied in the first film goes now to Jake Moore (Shia LaBeouf), a lightweight with big dreams, but also with a good streak to him because he’s focusing his investing efforts on green energy. Jake is the new and improved Gekko, even though he doesn’t know it himself yet.

Jake has a perfect life, living in his perfect Manhattan apartment, driving his perfect bike to his perfect job, and making love to his perfect soon-to-be-fiancée Winnie (Carey Mulligan) who, ironically, hates everything Wall Street. The fact that her father is Gordon Gekko himself, of course, has a lot to do with it.

It’s now 2008 and Wall Street is beginning to feel the first waves of what will turn out to be a major financial earthquake. As Jake’s firm, Keller Zabel, goes belly up and his founder (and Jake’s mentor, Louis Zabel, played to perfection by Frank Langella) throws himself under the train, a new villain takes the scene.

Josh Brolin, critics believe, was born for chunky roles, parts of men who are so determined they could sweep everything in their path to get what they want. His Bretton James, the uber-slick and stylish villain in “Wall Street 2,” is no different, except perhaps in the sense that Stone worked hard to remove even the slightest trace of a redeeming quality in him.

As the film progresses (at too slow a pace for many), it becomes clear that there may be more to Jake’s apparent good streak and Gekko’s jail-earned humility and penance than meets the eye. For more than half of the film, audiences are kept guessing, as questions continue to jump at them from all sides.

Is Gekko really sorry and thinking only of winning back the affections of estranged Winnie? Will Jake see his three-fold dream come true – get revenge, get a happy family and make money off green energy? Will scoundrel Bretton pay for his past and current crimes? Will the incipient crisis really be the end of the world? Will this movie ever come to a conclusion?

“The one thing I learned in jail is that money is not the prime asset in life. Time is,” Gekko says at one point. By the end of the 133-minute “Wall Street,” audiences too will learn the same lesson – and chances are not many will be happy about it.

Instead of building a story, Stone lays down the arguments of a sermon. What’s worse, he eventually fails at it by giving in to a happy ending that is as predictable as it’s unwanted, simply because it feels forced.

The script by Allan Loeb and Stephen Schiff takes countless plots and subplots, twists them all together in a film that asks a lot of questions, but only answers them in the most falsely polite and meaningless manner.

Of course, that’s not to say the journey to the rather disappointing end is not a (visually) gorgeous one. With lots of help from cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto, Stone builds a movie where each part is as superb as the other, from the landscapes to the set pieces and the wardrobe.

The characters that populate the “Wall Street” world don’t just live for power: they wear it in their suits and slicked-back hairdos, they eat and drink it at their majestic charity balls, and breathe it in their fancy condos filled with art pieces that any museum in the world would kill to have.

New York itself is a character in “Wall Street,” so brilliantly portrayed that, critics say, any outsider becomes instantly jealous of not living there. The way in which the story is told is a character of sorts, because, as fans must know, Stone takes more pleasure in the way he makes something happen onscreen than he does in the thing (in this case, the story) itself.

The characters, though types by all definition, are also brilliant in many respects. There’s no comparing the original Gekko to this new and ambiguous one (author and preacher against the evils he once embodied and perfected), but Douglas still shines in the part that made of him one of the most esteemed actors of modern cinematography.

LaBeouf, though apparently an odd choice, shows he too can play with the big dogs, which is strongly apparent whenever he shares the screen with either Douglas or Brolin: the chemistry is all there, and it’s working just fine. For a seemingly lightweight, LaBeouf carries quite a heavy punch.

Brolin, as also noted above, is outstanding in his part of a minion / guard dog of the bigger-than-life Jules Steinhardt (Eli Wallach), one of the few remaining Wall Streeters to remember the previous crash, of ’29, and to know that this is going to end badly.

The only actors of this stellar cast to have been slighted by Stone through his handling of the camera and plot are Langella (who is not allowed more screentime because of his very role) and Susan Sarandon. This is a thespian who can make extremely relatable characters come to life – yet she’s given a stereotype to work with, thus limiting her.

However, no injustice is as big as the one done to Mulligan. This young actress, who has more than proved the kind of range she’s capable of in “An Education” is here reduced to two expressions: either pensive or distressed.

By the time the ending credits come, many will feel the same, critics believe. “Wall Street” is a good movie but not a strong one – definitely not as brilliant a sequel as audiences may expect.

“Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps” runs 133 minutes (3 minutes less than the version premiered at Cannes), and is rated PG-13 for brief strong language and thematic elements. It opened in the US on September 24, will reach the UK on October 6 and conclude its run in Japan, on January 28, 2011.


The Good

Oliver Stone has a way of telling a story that is unmistakable and truly memorable. His skills and the support of a brilliant cast (Douglas, LaBeouf, Mulligan, Brolin and Susan Sarandon, among others) bring to life a dog-eat-dog world as fascinating as it’s corrupt to the very core. “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps” is like a peek one takes behind the curtain of a very exclusive world: gorgeous, impressive but ultimately purposeless.

The Bad

“Wall Street,” the sequel, is trying to say that money never sleeps. Audiences, though, are running a very high risk of doing so, especially if they’re looking for a follow-up worthy of (not to mention able to top) the original 1987 film.

The Truth

All in all, “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps” is a very good movie if compared to other releases of the year, but almost nothing if pitted against the original, to which it has very little connection save some characters. Still, it’s a must-see, all flaws considered.

Photo Gallery (7 Images)

Shia LaBeouf and Michael Douglas come face to face in Oliver Stone’s “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”
Shia LaBeouf and Michael Douglas come face to face in Oliver Stone’s “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”Shia LaBeouf as Jake Moore, the ambitious, “green” stockbroker
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