This weekend, the hottest movie at the box office was the horror "Paranormal Activity 2," pulling in $40.7 million according to Deadline. I had a hunch this would happen.
However, I made a conscious decision not to go see the movie; I hate horror movies. It's not like I'm afraid or anything... I just don't like them, OK?!
Instead, I saw Oliver Stone's "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps," which has pulled in a respectable $50 million since its Sept. 24 opening, according to Los Angeles Times.
Coupled with its surprising mediocrity (maybe I was just over-excited to see "Wall Street"), this movie suggests a correlation between financial success and corruption: an argument I have fought through out my life. In the film, not one successful character has a clean record; everybody with money either cheats and lies, or works with people who cheat and lie.
For many students, myself included, going to school is simply a stepping stone to reaching our financial goals (as opposed to the idealist, who goes to school to "learn"). I'm not spending all this time so that I can go out into the real world and cheat my way to success.
To believe that nobody cheats in the professional world would be naive. However, I just don't see myself cheating and lying to others in the future to get to where I want to be. I refuse to buy into the notion that I will need to do so to be successful. Can I get an "Amen?"
Regardless of my feelings, the movie kept playing, so I kept watching even though I was ideologically opposed to where the plot was headed.
After making the importance of cheating in success a common theme through out the film, Stone then depicts secret meetings in which the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board meets with the Wall Street bigwigs to discuss a bailout plan after the financial market collapsed in 2008 (which happened in real life). Arbitray numbers, like $700 billion, were tossed around, and the chairman blindly went with what he heard.
I admit that I do kind of agree with this criticism of our society. I am generally a capitalist and an Adam Smith believer, who argued that people are inherently good and that financial markets will regulate themselves accordingly.
The movie shows how the government not only regulated the markets after the 2008 financial crisis, but wagered public funds in hopes that the economy would turn around. If the headstrong government has shown that it will support an ailing economy, what's to stop financially influential people from acting the same way they did before the crisis?
I believe that if everyone acted in their best interest (more for the long term than the short term), we wouldn't be dealing with this financial crisis and I wouldn't have had to sit through a disappointing movie.
Individuals should not have taken on mortgages they would not be able to afford in the future. Banks should not have made it so easy for people to become homeowners, and then increased the interest rates so much that people would not be able to afford their mortgages. The government isn't acting in its best interest by blindly bailing out the economy because there's nothing stopping the financial sector from putting the country in a similar situation in the future.
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I would really like feedback, so please leave comments below!
Have you ever seen the t.v show Spin crowd? Command West PR would be lucky to have you! I must admit I have not seen a movie in the past two months. Your blogs are a great "replacement" so to speak.
ReplyDeleteThe never ending battle of good versus evil ultimately boils down to money and power in my opinion, knowledge and piety does not put food in the stomach after all. In my opinion the movie is trying to simplify the complex world Finance. It would be silly to assume that everyone who has "made it" in a capitalist society has cheated their way to the top. The Characters are depicted as greedy cheats and liars because, those attributes are universal, rich or poor.
It was greed that caused the financial crisis of 2008. When the Fed lowered the interest rates to 1% investors wanted to look for new places to invest with a higher rate of return than bonds. Consequently the average American was encouraged to buy. Banks were fueled by avarice and sold mortgage backed securities to investors and it was regarded as a safe investment, receiving the highest possible rating (when it was anything but). By the time everyone who wanted a house had gotten one, the investors were hooked on to the MB securities, they wanted more like a crack head needs cocaine and a bath. Thus they started giving out loans to NINJA''s (No Income No Assests) these NINJA's didn't know any better, they thought they were climbing up the social ladder, that they too had found the American Dream, and the people handing out the loans like hot cakes were blinded by the dreams of $$$$$. Long story short when the Interest rate went up people started to default, and the investors were left with worthless houses, and the world learned why greed is one of the 7 deadly sins.
Getting back to the movie, it is quite disappointing that the wrong message is being spread, " that it is okay to be a greedy cheat, just be smart about it". Quite frankly I think the Fat cats on wall street, with their Harvard degrees in hand thought they were pretty darn smart...weren't they?
However in the end movies are made as a means for people to escape reality, to live a fantasy for two hours, and since movies are watched by the " Average Joe/Jane" it feels nice for them to see a relatable guy beating the system and getting rich fast.
Maybe in this case the Idealists got it right. But I'd still rather wake up in the morning next to a supermodel in my $3 million mansion and not be able to look at myself in the mirror, as I get ready to go to work in my Maserati. After all isn't that the American Dream?
You can get an "Amen". Cheating your way to the top as the best means to success is one of the things that bothers me most. I recently overheard a friend of mine comment on another hardworking student, "He's gana make it because he is not afraid to cheat and fu** people over". Finanly, a movie that comes around that makes people think and question it, a little past the first couple steps out of the theater.
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