Under all the unnecessary fluff, we have here an important movie

Rating: 7/10 (4 August 2016)

"The Big Short" by Adam McKay is a curious movie, in the sense that it is a Hollywood production which straightforwardly points its finger to the banks, the rating agencies, wellall American economy after all, blaming it for its relentless behavior which led to the 2008 World economy collapse, and all the disastrous consequences that came from it.
So, here we have Hollywood doing something that very rarely does, which is public service in the most direct way possible, resuming the reasons that led to the recent economic crisis (which, by itself, is a hard subject for a Hollywood film), and burning the symbols of American capitalism to the ground, before our very eyes. A pretty bold move, huh?
It's always good to see the greatest entertainment industry of the World trying to give its two cents on some first-order social issues, and "The Big Short" is worth watching for this reason alone. Unfortunately, the film has its faults, which taint its valorous ambition, faults that I'll try to resume here:

Even though the theoretical bulk of the story is simplified to its core, "The Big Short" might not be very user-friendly for those who are not into the issue. For those ones, one viewing of the movie will most likely not be enough to catch all the technical details presented.

Some aesthetic aspects employed on the film are not relevant at all for the story itself, and only shows an attempt from the filmmakers to turn "The Big Short" more appetizing for the general audience it is addressing, namely:

the shaky, constantly on-focusing camera used on many sequences, trying to give an urgent feeling to the story;

constant fourth-wall breaking done by the characters, doing aside remarks to the audience;

flashbacks, oh the damned flashbacks, providing some background story to our characters, desperately clawing for our empathy towards them. Emotional manipulation at its rancid best. Remember that most of these guys are still making obscene profits out of people's misery. As Vennett perfectly puts out, they're not the heroes of this story. Some of them might question the morality of their own actions, but that won't stop them from doing them.

Despite its visual excesses, "The Big Short" is worth seeing for those who want to understand, on a nutshell, the recent collapse of the world economy. Just don't forget to refresh your notion of "mortgage" before watching it, I assure you it will be of great help!