THE BIG SHORT: A Thoroughly Entertaining Lesson

Let’s be honest, how well do you really know your own finances? Do you keep a budget, evaluate it regularly, and monitor your bank accounts, debt, and investments? Remember, I asked for honesty.

If, like many people, your answer isn’t something you’re particularly proud of, then you’re guilty of a widespread and potentially disastrous habit that The Big Short points out early on: you aren’t looking. It’s nothing to be ashamed of; we all let certain things slip by in life. The problem comes when institutions and overseers do it, leaving too few people with the foresight to see a brick wall looming.

This and some greed was the recipe for the housing market collapse and subsequent economic crisis of 2007-2008, which The Big Short documents through the eyes of the few people who saw it coming.

Wait, This Is About The Housing Market?

Yes, The Big Short is a deep-dive into loans, financial swaps, and the eccentricities of bankers and investors. It also happens to be a slick piece of entertainment, the balance of which is a rather remarkable parlor trick to behold. Its secret is that it has no secrets; it’s up front and honest about being a fictional movie, utilizing narrative shortcuts and peppy editing to make its potentially groan-inducing plot points go down smooth. When technical terms have to be explained, it breaks the fourth wall and throws to something like Margot Robbie in a bathtub, and the definition instantly becomes more appealing.

The screenplay comes from the odd duo of Charles Randolph and Adam McKay, the latter also serving as director. Randolph began his career writing crime thrillers like The Life of David Gale and The Interpreter while McKay is the long-time writing partner and director of Will Ferrell. It’s easy to imagine who came up with what here.

The film is structured as a kind of thriller, following the disparate people who bet against the housing market and incredulously watched it fall apart. Mark that part for Randolph. Then you have the cheeky humor that’s diffused throughout, taking sure-aimed shots at everyone and everything involved. That part goes to McKay.

This mixed tone will have you alternatively laughing and boiling with anger. The swings can be exhilarating, but your personal taste will play a factor here. The perfect balance of these two tones will be different for everyone, and while I found its mixture to be spot on, you may feel differently.

Where It Goes Too Far

There are some pretty heady ideas at the heart of The Big Short, including the intangibility of money and the flippancy with which many people use it. This is the kind of stuff that The New York Times writes think pieces on and is very ambitious material for a film.

This shouldn’t be surprising considering that The Big Short is based on a non-fiction book by Michael Lewis, whose other works have served as the basis for Moneyball and The Blind Side. It’s the kind of material that any screenwriter would struggle to condense smoothly, and The Big Short isn’t immune to these problems.

The film simply hits these themes too hard, lacking subtlety and at times feeling far too leading. The conclusions it’s trying to bring us to aren’t controversial (it’s hard to argue against them when a global economic crash is involved), and yet it goes about communicating them with an overwhelming moral repugnance.

McKay adds in many visual cues to get us there, most notably his consistent use of shots that are a bit tight on the characters’ faces, which contrasts nicely with the film’s final image. If he had relied on these things and the story’s natural progression, then the audience would’ve gotten to these themes on their own. Instead, characters outright state and repeat the same ideas, drawing out the film’s back half and leaving intuitive audience members likely to feel a bit force-fed.

The Ensemble

What drew early headlines for this film was its remarkable cast, with marketing pushing the quadruplet of Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt. In reality, the cast is even more massive and star-studded than that, with small roles filled out by the likes of Melissa Leo, Max Greenfield, and Marisa Tomei. It’s one of those movies where everywhere you look is someone you know or recognize, but it manages to never be distracting nor excessive.

Now don’t get too excited at the prospect of seeing Bale and Gosling yelling at each other, because much of the cast never appears together on screen. Many of the characters bet against the housing market independently, making each of their storylines play out almost entirely separate.

Each group is not given equal weight, however, so certain characters disappear for long stretches of time. This incohesive narrative is another reason why the film feels a bit long, and it becomes easy to forget characters when they’ve been absent for significant stretches.

To a man, though, these characters are immaculately drawn and cast. Each actor pitched their performance to just the right level, with Carell and Gosling going big while Pitt, Finn Wittrock, and John Magaro keep their story a bit more tamped down. Each performance is noteworthy in its own right, but what’s most impressive is that the ensemble itself works, with each actor finding his or her own way through a tonally varied movie while still working towards the same goal.

Final Take

The Big Short is a narratively ambitious film with its sights set on a wide audience. The cast should be enough to get people in the theater, and it will win them over as soon as its rambunctious style kicks in. Its faults aren’t hidden, but neither is its remarkable ability to entertain while giving a rather complex lesson.

What film has your favorite mix of comedy and intelligence? Let me know in the comments!

The Big Short is out now in the U.S., with a U.K. release slated for January 22nd, 2016. Worldwide release dates can be found here.