Foresight

Rating: Null/10 (25 January 2016)

Foreseeing the burst of the housing bubble that triggered the Global Financial Crisis of 2008, three sets of players in the high finance world elect to "bet against the American economy" and reap the benefits in this offbeat mix of comedy and drama, based on a book by 'Moneyball' author Michael Lewis. There are some truly zany touches as characters break the fourth wall and announce that certain events "didn't really happen that way" and there are interesting interludes in which celebrities such as Selena Gomez explain some of the finer technical terms required to understand the story. The film also has a complex editing design with montages of pop culture, scenes noticeably cut short and certain images paused for extended periods, all of which works to make the film anything but the didactic take on the situation that it so easily could have been; by contrast, it is more engaging than 'Inside Job' and it does a better job elucidating what exactly occurred. The crux of the film though are the characters who experience inner conflict over whether or not they are really 'good guys' by profiteering from the GFC. The characters are not explored in extreme depth (give or take Steve Carell as the closest the film has to a protagonist), however, they work well within their function in the plot, provoking us to evaluate whether there are really any heroes in the film's real life inspired story. The most remarkable aspect of the film though is how frequently funny it is. It is quite rare for a comedy (which 'The Big Short' primarily is) to spin such a passionate indictment of injustice.