Review of Wall Street (1987) by Sean C — 21 Sep 2010

I saw this years ago but decided to re-watch it now in anticipation of its sequel hitting theaters this weekend: 'Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps'. It was interesting to note that in one scene in this movie Michael Douglas's character Gordon Gecko calls Charlie Sheen's character early in the morning just before sunrise and says "money never sleeps", lol, just thought that was cool that part of the title for the sequel comes from a direct quote from the original. Also in the sequel, or at least its trailer, is the quote "greed, for lack of a better word, is good" which is a quote Gordon refers to having said before and yes it is in the original.

As far as this movie is concerned I liked it. I think there are some areas that can be improved on a bit for the sequel such as the main story and maybe a bit more drama and more action, if possible. Overall though this is a solidly entertaining movie about the timely topic of insider trading that was going on in the mid 80s. I am sure with all that has happened on Wall Street recently Oliver Stone had plenty of ideas for the plot for his sequel.

I liked the dramatic tension of Charlie Sheen playing a character whose father was played by his real father Martin Sheen. It gave the scenes they were in together added believability. Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen were the standouts as far as acting goes in this one and I look forward to seeing how Shia LeBeouf does in the sequel as the young male lead. Carey Mulligan also looks good so far from the tiny bit I have seen in the trailer so her part will be interesting. I saw that in this movie Gordon had a baby son and in the sequel he has a daughter which will need to be explained because SPOILER ALERT at the end of this one it is apparent Gordon gets arrested after Charlie's character wears a wire. So if he goes to jail and it appears Gordon gets out of jail at the start of the sequel I don't know when he was able to get his wife pregnant with a girl. Unless she was already pregnant before he was arrested or maybe the prison had conjugal visits LOL.

So in summary this movie on its own is a lot of fun and has some great acting, a decent story that keeps you interested to the end. Now having refreshed my memory about what happened in this I look forward to the sequel.