Much of the Plot was Lost in the Language it Used

Rating: 6/10 (8 February 2016)

I went into this movie with some expectations. It won a bunch of awards, was highly praised, and is even a major nominee for best picture. After watching it I'd say that while it was well done, it's not deserving of the praise that it received.
The plot of The Big Short is showing how the economy crashed in the 2000s, taken from the perspective of four different people who all see it coming. Unfortunately, most of the specifics of the plot are lost in the banking mumbo jumbo that the film uses. While this does add a level of realism to it, it's really not convenient for people like me. Even with the asides used to explain certain things, they still weren't enough. Often they used banking mumbo jumbo to explain the other banking mumbo jumbo, and when they didn't do that they used examples that aren't exactly easy to understand. Nevertheless, I caught onto phrases like "increased unemployment" and such, so I still got the general idea of the story. However, the plot never felt perilous to me. I never felt like some specific bad banking thing might happen because like I said I couldn't understand a word that anyone said. So what caused the unemployment increase is completely unknown to me. Plus I already knew the end outcome, so there wasn't really any tension. Nevertheless, I thought that the plot was done well enough that people like me were still able to pick up on it, just not specific things.
The characters were surprisingly good. They felt like relatively real people, particularly Steve Carell's character. Most of the other characters ended up coming off as people who existed because they knew about the economic crash coming up. While they were developed reasonably well, they felt kind of pointless. Brad Pitt and the characters connected to him felt especially pointless. But maybe that was because I just couldn't understand the mumbo jumbo, so what they accomplished was unknown to me. Christian Bale's character was, although important, really not that focused on, probably because all his segments involved him sitting in an office chair blasting heavy metal music. He really didn't do much other than at the beginning of the movie. Ryan Gosling and Steve Carell's characters were really the only people who were important throughout, but they were also the primarily focused on characters.
Something that kind of confused and bothered me was that all the characters did for entertainment was go to strip clubs. They all acted like the only form of entertainment was that. It's not that I think that sexual stuff makes a bad movie, it's just that everyone acted like there were only two things in the world: work and strip clubs. Has anyone ever read a book? Watched a movie? No? And it wasn't that just one or two characters did this, it seemed like everyone did this. Every banker in the movie pretty much.
The sudden musical cues bothered me too. There would be crap music blasting for a bit, then someone would start talking and it would stop abruptly, then start again when they stopped talking. Then they'd play parts from the music video of that particular song and it was just confusing, and a little annoying too.
The asides in the movie were used quite well. They weren't overdone to point of annoying, but they were often enough so that it felt normal when they happened. They all happen naturally too, and they were pretty quick. Generally I'm not a fan of fourth wall breaking, but this movie did it well.
Overall The Big Short is, while completely overrated, a solid movie nonetheless. The plot is still understandable for people like me, the characters are good, and the asides are used well. Unfortunately the specifics of the plot were unclear, the lack of other (and more realistic) entertainment, semi-useless characters, and musical cues and choices weren't so great. In the end I'd still recommend The Big Short, but you'd probably enjoy it more if you actually work at a bank or study it more than I do (which I never do).