As a rule I try to steer clear of movies that contain colons, both grammatical and anatomical. Granted there are some notable exceptions, but for every Dr Stranglove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb there’s fifty Ballistic: Ecks vs Severs. Couple this with the fact that I’ve been whole heartedly underwhelmed by Oliver Stone’s last three box office contributions and you will see how the prospect of enduring Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps was not something I was relishing.
With twenty three years between Stone’s two trips to Wall Street you’d have thought the director had had enough time to really postulate on what exactly that time had done to the avaricious Gordon Gekko. Unfortunately it would appear that Hollywood’s favourite conspiracy theorist has been filling his time with other, more pressing questions like ‘Who did kill off the electric car?’ and ‘How do they get those boats inside the little glass bottles?’
As a result Money Never Sleeps plays out like a do-over, as Stone tries his level best to improve upon his frankly, quite amateurish, 80’s set original. To a certain degree he succeeds. Shia LeBeouf, whilst not great, is a dramatic improvement on Charlie Sheen’s Bud Fox. The slow, deliberate corruption of Lebeouf’s young trader is far more sympathetic than the originals “greed is good” philosophy.
As you’d expect there’s some stunning photography of New York. At times it almost feels like Stone is using creative landscaping to remind you that he is in fact a film maker of some merit despite his recent bad run.
Of course, cinematography will only get you so far and it soon becomes clear that the real star of this piece is our very own Carey Mulligan.
Whilst you will no doubt leave the auditorium with the suspicion that she was criminally underused, the young Brit brings a humanity to the film which was notable by its absence in first film. Although her character, Winnie Gekko, serves as little more than a plot device Mulligan milks it for all it’s worth, drawing out better performances from her co-stars in the process.
Without Mulligan Money Never Sleeps would be yet another failed attempt to reignite passion for all things eighties. More established stars like Douglas, Josh Brolin and Frank Langella fail to stand out from what is unquestionably an affectionately shot city-scape and as a result the film becomes somewhat of a non event. If you are a fan of the first movie then you may well find this an acceptable sequel but it’s unlikely to win over any new comers.
