A decent, albeit flawed true story film.

Rating: 6/10 (6 January 2016)

'The Big Short' stars Christian Bale, Steve Carrel, Ryan Gosling, Brad Pitt, and a whole lot of others. It is directed by veteran comedy director Adam McKay (Anchorman). This is his first foray into directing a complex story and, for the most part, it works. The is about the market crash that occurred in 2007. How the worlds economy was propped up on loans that people either hadn't paid off or were behind on. Now, this is normally not a film that would intrigue any one. It revolves around banking and boring adult stuff that even adults don't seem to care about. But that is why 'The Big Short' succeeds. It takes this kind of boring concept and makes it interesting. Surprisingly enough this film handles its source material with relative grace. Of course the film is irreverent and in your face but it doesn't treat this material as a "they cheated the system" type of movie. No, the movie blatantly shows these people trying, to no avail, to warn anyone who would listen about what was about to happen.
It shows that, although these people became millionaires, they didn't want to see this happen. For whatever reason they saw what no one else could see and acted on it. This is what the film does best. It treats the material with respect (more or less). It is able to show that not one person even cared about how corrupt the system was. And that this wasn't something easily missed.
It made this fact abundantly clear. In doing this it was able to show how scummy these big banks were. And it was also able to show that these characters weren't happy that they were the ones to find this. They knew how many people would lose their homes and lively hood if they were right.
However this would not have had near as much impact if the actors playing these characters did a poor job. And each actor involved in the film was great. Each one was able to show their disgust with what they were finding and their longing to tell people before it was too late. It was hard to watch them go through this without losing yourself into this world that they were in.
While the film does handle things fairly well, it can't escape the incredibly pretentious aura that emanates from it. Why it feels the need to stop and explain random things using uncomfortable celebrity cameos I will never know. The one thing I do know is that when the film announces them as a sports commentator announces a player it comes off incredibly out of place and pretentious.
As I sat watching the film I couldn't understand why this decision was made. Or why the film felt like it should break the 4th wall for no real reason. Yes, it stays in line with the awkward, distracting documentary style of cinematography but other than that, there seems to be no explanation for this. So when the film decides to talk directly to the audience it makes the film become exactly that, awkward and distracting.
Now, this doesn't make the film bad. I very much enjoyed 'The Big Short'. It was just the right amount of irreverent and dramatic to be both educational and entertaining. But why the film decides to present itself in an over the top unconventional style I will never know. It wants to be different so badly that it opts for uncomfortable scenes to be carried out in order to achieve this. When it does this I can't help but be slightly repulsed by how much the film feels like it needs to pat itself on the back.