Review of Wall Street (1987) by Eric D — 06 Jul 2010

These days, a film like 'Wall Street' hits home. The recession and the reigning in of Wall Street (at least in the US) all have their roots in actions such as those portrayed by the characters in Oliver Stone's "exposé" of investment bankers without conscience.

It's interesting to watch real-life father and son, Martin and Charlie Sheen, in their roles here. I actually forgot they who they were until near the halfway point of the movie where I thought, "Gee, Charlie Sheen really looks like... Wait." I wonder how much of their actual relationship dynamics poured into their performances.

Michael Douglas plays the role he would be essentially typecast for (seemingly) the rest of his post-Wall Street career: the rich white guy who doesn't seem to care about anyone else. It isn't really a shock to see that his performance wound up earning him a Best Actor Oscar. You can actually see the guy acting like this in real life.

More than that, though, the movie just seemed average to me. Even with its relevance today, it just felt ho-hum. One stand-out performance and a few other fairly solid ones don't a masterpiece make, after all. The script works, but isn't mindblowing either (save for Douglas's "Greed is good" speech near the middle of the film). It isn't bad, and it isn't even my "it didn't suck" category. It's good, just not great.

Unless you're incredibly interested in the going-ons of investment bankers and stock brokers, or really have a hate-on for the greed that is Capitalism, you might end up being even more bored than I was beginning to feel.