Wall Street

Plot synopsis:
New York City, 1985. Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) is an ambitious, young junior stockbroker at Jackson Steinem & Co. a local Wall Street stock and trading firm, desperate to get to the top. He wants to become involved with his hero, the corporate raider Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas), a ruthless and legendary Wall Street player.After work, Fox's meets with his father Carl (Martin Sheen), at a bar in nearby Queens for drinks. Carl Fox is a blue-collar maintenance foreman for a small and struggling airline company called Bluestar Airlines. In a casual conversation, Carl tells Bud that the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) has cleared Bluestar of responsibility for a major incident in which it was involved.Some days later, Bud Fox visits Gordon Gekko on his birthday and, granted a brief interview, pitches him stocks of a few promising companies, but Gekko is unimpressed. Realizing that Gekko may not do business with him, a desperate Fox provides him with the information about Bluestar which the FAA has yet to make public. Gekko tells him he will think about it. A dejected Fox returns to his office where Gekko places an order for Bluestar stock, becoming one of Fox's clients.Over the next few weeks, Fox makes more stock deals with Gekko which fall through, but the corporate raider has taken a liking for the young man and takes him under his wing. However, Gekko makes it clear that he does not want just a few tips on the stock market: he wants inside information of the sort that should be confidential, obtained by any means necessary, even if it involves using unethical and illegal methods. Desperate to advance in life, Fox agrees.One of his first assignments is to spy on British corporate raider Sir Lawrence Wildman (Terence Stamp) and discern his next move. By following Wildman through New York, Fox discovers that he is out to take control of a major steel company, Anacott, in Pennsylvania and informs Gekko who leaks the news to the press and then and buys the controlling shares.On that weekend, Gekko invites Fox to his house on the Hamptons in Long Island where Fox gets a look at the corporate raider's family life and gets to meet his wife Kate (Sean Young), the mother of Gekko's two-year-old son Rudy and infant daughter. Fox also has a run-in with an attractive blond lady who introduces herself as Darien (Daryl Hannah). Over drinks, Darien tells Fox that she works as an interior decorator in New York and she knows Gekko because he is a frequent client of hers and has done work on his house and city apartment. Fox asks Darien out on a date for later, and she agrees to one. A little later, Wildman arrives uninvited and confronts Gekko about the takeover of the steel company. Wildman claims that he is not out to "asset strip" the steel company but to improve its infrastructure and make something of it. After trading some personal insults, the two men agree to a deal where Gekko will sell it back to Wildman for a large cost.Over the next year, Fox's star is on the rise. He makes good money and enjoys Gekko's perks, including purchasing a penthouse on Manhattan's Upper East Side and Darien becomes his trophy live-in mistress. However, it is hinted that Darien is a former lover of Gekko's. Still employed by Jackson Steinem, Fox is promoted as a result of the large commission fees he is bringing in from Gekko's trading and is given a corner office with a view. He continues to maximize insider information, going so far as disguising himself as a cleaning company supervisor and breaking into the offices of lawyers and businesses after hours in order to obtain necessary data.Fox believes that the Bluestar Airlines can be improved and made a commercial success. He persuades Gekko to buy Bluestar and expand it using savings achieved by union concessions. The union leaders, including Fox's father Carl, are invited to Fox's apartment in order to discuss the proposal. Only Carl Fox proves to be hostile to the idea since he does not trust Gekko and feels that Gekko only wants to buy up and then liquidate the airline, but, after a row with his son, he agrees to put it to his men.Things seem to be going well, but then Fox learns at a shareholders meeting that Gekko has indeed double-crossed him and in fact intends to sell off all of Bluestar's assets leaving Carl and the entire Bluestar staff unemployed once the stock peaks at it's price. Fox himself stands to make a fortune on such a move but is racked with guilt since it was never his intention to break up Bluestar, especially since many of the staff happen to be friends whom he has known for a long time and friends of his father's. Just then, Fox learns that his father has been admitted to the hospital from a heart attack. At his father's bedside, Fox apologizes to his father for doubting him.From this point onward, Fox resolves to destroy Gekko's plans to take over Bluestar. Darien tries to talk him out of it, pointing out the money that they are going to earn and the danger of making an enemy out of Gekko. Fox refuses to listen to her arguments and they break up, leading her to walk out on him for good.A few days later, Fox and the union leaders privately meet Gekko's rival, Sir Laurence Wildman, who agrees to take over ownership of Bluestar, and, in return for union concessions, save it from being stripped. The next day, Fox then gets his colleagues at Jackson Steinem to persuade their clients to invest in Bluestar. Using Gekko's own methods, he leaks the news of Gekko's takeover of Bluestar which sends the share price up. The union leaders then confront Gekko, warning him that they know of his plans to liquidate the company (which of course he calmly denies) and threatening to make life so difficult for the customers that by the time the company is broken up it will be next to worthless.Gekko decides to cut his loses and pull out of Bluestar - "What the hell. So we only make 10 million instead of 20 million." - but Fox then gets his contacts to dump their Bluestar stocks... which sends the share price down! Gekko is unable to find buyers for his own stock, "I am losing millions!", and is forced to sell at a loss. Once the share price has gone down as far as it can, Wildman buys it up, taking over Bluestar. Gekko is furious and knows who to blame.The next day, a triumphant Fox arrives at work at Jackson Steinem & Co. where he is confronted by the police and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Apparently Gekko tipped them off about Fox's insider dealings which they themselves have been investigating for some time. Fox is arrested, handcuffed and led out of the office in tears.Some time later, Fox confronts Gekko in rainy Central Park. Gekko berates him for his betrayal. He then viciously assaults Fox, but not before mentioning several of their illegal business transactions. Unknown to Gekko, Fox was wearing a wire which he then turns over to the federal authorities.A few days later, Carl Fox drives his son to the New York City courthouse where he will face the consequences for his insider trading and securities fraud charges. After having a few words with his father, Fox exits the car and walks up the steps to the courthouse alone as the image pans back to the skyline view of New York. It is strongly implied that Bud Fox will go to jail for his greed, but his co-operation to implicate Gekko with him in their insider trading schemes could mean a lesser sentence and Wildman has offered him a job at Bluestar upon his release... whenever that will be.

Tags: revenge, cult, comedy, violence

Review:
Michael Douglas's performance as Gekko won a deserved Oscar in 1988 and makes "Wall Street" required viewing.There are two schools of thought when it comes to money.
"Money itself isn't lost or made, it's simply transferred," he tells his young protégé Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen).No question writer-director Oliver Stone feels the same way, as he presents this tale of wealth acquisition at its very apex, lower Manhattan circa 1985.
Deceptively deep and complex picture from co-writer/director Oliver Stone paints a vivid portrait of 1980s over-excesses as the age of "Me, Me, Me" (otherwise known as the 1980s) is explored through the eyes of a young, eager and impatient stockbroker (Charlie Sheen) who moonlights as a liaison to a heartless, ruthless and crazily greedy mega-millionaire (Michael Douglas in a smashing Oscar-winning turn) who seemingly has his hands on most every aspect of big business.
The film follows a low level day trader (Charlie Sheen) who strives to become a very powerful figure on Wall Street like his idol Gordon Geckko (Michael Douglas).
Michael Douglas deservedly won an Oscar for his portrayal of the ruthless, chain-smoking capitalist guru, Gordon Gekko, who leads Charlie Sheen's Bud Fox down the garden path to Wall Street's hidden abyss.
So did Charlie Sheen, who is actually the star of the film despite the fact that most people remember "Wall Street" for Douglas as Gordon Gecko.
First of all, it's amazing now to see how young, baby-faced and gauche Charlie Sheen looks from this distance in time, particularly when he's trying to hit on Daryl Hannah.In today's dumbed down movie world, Gordon Gekko could have been scripted and played exactly the same except for one thing: you'd never see the scene when he suddenly stops to admire the ocean at dawn.
Other infelicities in the script include the moment when Stone wanted to signal that Bud Fox has reached the peak of success and found it empty: following the montage of the condo purchase and decoration, the perfect meal for two, culminating in making love to Daryl Hannah, Stone has Fox standing on his balcony, and apropos of nothing at all, he just says, "Who am I?"  It has to be said that Sheen wasn't really up to the task of delivering this atrocious line.I've rarely seen a film in which the female lead was so comprehensively abandoned by the director.
Only this time instead of caught between two opposing sergeants in the jungles of Vietnam, he's a Wall Street broker and his opposing sides he must choose between are his father played by his real-life father Martin Sheen and a conniving and greedy corporate executive played by Michael Douglas, who won the Oscar for Best Leading Actor the following year."Wall Street" shows Oliver Stone's skill and craftsmanship as a filmmaker.
With intense aspirations of being a Wall Street "player" like his personal hero Gordon Gekko (an unforgettable Michael Douglas), his pursuit of cash, women and expensive suits lead him to a moral dilemma between his father (Martin Sheen) and Gekko and ultimately to a confrontation of ethics within business and personal redemption.
With its case study of corporate ethics, and its comments on the concept of insider trading within the American stock-broking community, this film is a success on the professional level of looking at business as well as the more personal elements, including the hard-line philosophies of Gordon Gekko and furthermore the nature of the ambition that eats away at Bud Fox. The acting is excellent on the part of both Charlie and Martin Sheen as their respective roles as father and son, however the clear stand-out performance throughout the picture is clearly that of Michael Douglas in his brilliant, Oscar-winning portrayal of the ruthless Gordon Gekko.
Daryl Hannah, however, remains a substantial dent to the film's overall credibility and poses a serious case of mis-casting on the part of Oliver Stone that is essentially unforgivable when watching Hannah's pathetic attempts at working alongside such greats as Martin Sheen and Michael Douglas.
My favorite has to do with the "illusion of wealth."The other great quote that comes to mind is when Martin Sheen tells his son to "go out and produce something instead of making money on people's buying and selling."Of course, you then have the "abyss" speech "when you look into the abyss and nothing is staring back..." was great too."Congratulations buddy boy you just made things twice as tough as before," really hits home regarding the pressure to make quota."It's a dog with fleas." will live forever."Blue horseshoe loves it," is another quote that stands out.The screenplay was written outstandingly well.
The visuals are far from impressive, even though there are some pretty pictures of New York to look at, and the way the camera becomes a bit unsteady when something particularly intense is going on is interesting until Stone takes it too far, like when he turns a scene between Charlie and Martin Sheen that could have been great into something resembling a tennis game.
In other words, Wall Street has aged badly in some aspects.That being said, the film does feature some highly memorable performances, Michael Douglas' deliciously sleazy Gordon Gekko being the highlight.
Michael Douglas is so bad that he is so good in his role as Gordon Gekko in "Wall Street." With this performance, I can see why he is an academy award winner.Michael Douglas's performance in "Wall Street" made me realize that each role he turns in will turn into gold.I must give credit to Charlie Sheen for his part of making "Wall Street" a success." This movie was not only his breakthrough film of his career, but the best one to date.
Let's just say Martin Sheen almost steals the thunder from Michael Douglas and his son.After watching awful movies dealing with the same subject, such as "Boiler Room" and "Glengarry Glen Ross," I didn't want to watch "Wall Street." However, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that this film turned out to have a different plot.
Sheen's Bud Fox character eventually has an epiphany, augured by the coincidence of real-life and cinema dad Martin copping a heart attack and turns on and indeed turns in his guru to the authorities to bring ultimate closure to the piece.The film has its faults; I didn't quite buy into Douglas surrogate-father figure appeal to Sheen Jr., the coincidental heart attack of Sheen/Fox Sr is a bit too pat and some of the supporting characters come on like mere ciphers, including Terence Stamp as the UK magnate-cum-nemesis of Gekko and Daryl Hannah as a Gekko cast-off girlfriend/groupie who becomes young Sheen's trophy girl-friend.
al to the addictive drug of big-bucks capitalism.Stone's camera is constantly on the move, capturing the frenetic-ism of dealers on the trading floor as market frenzy takes hold, with the dialogue razor-sharp throughout, so many of the phrases of course having become clichés for that era, almost entering common parlance the language, such as greed is good, lunch is for wimps and more.In the end, young Sheen would have done well to be careful what he wished for, but if he's the Little Red Riding Hood to Douglas' Big Bad Wolf, this particular out-sized fairy tale reaches its conclusion fittingly and satisfyingly, opening up a seamy, selfish world that you know is out there still, now more than ever..
He spends his time idolizing and trying to get in touch with billionaire Wall Street tycoon, Gordon Gecko(Douglas in a good, but heartless Oscar winning performance.) He finally gets in touch with him and soon begins working for him, giving him inside tips about his father's(Martin Sheen, as an aircraft mechanic) company and helping him buy up other company stocks.
As Bud learns, money isn't the only way to measure success, and greed and heartlessness aren't for everyone.Charlie Sheen gives a very good performance - he's well cast as is, of course, Martin Sheen as his wise father who has a different set of values and recognizes Gecko's motives even if his son doesn't.
Until she got her eye plucked out of her skull in Kill Bill Volume 2, Daryl Hannah brought lifelessness to every role she was in, including her performance as Darian Taylor, the "great spender of OTHER people's money", in Oliver Stone's otherwise good movie, Wall Street.
You really felt the greed in Michael Douglas' Gordon Gecko and could feel the changes in Charlie Sheen's Bud Fox, but whenever Daryl walk on the screen, the entire energy flow that was present beforehand, was completely obliterated by her presence.
Wall street is one of those movies you can watch over and over again.While it might not be as appealing to those who are less interested in the fields of economics and business, it's still worth a watch.The acting is mostly outstanding, Michael Douglas makes a legendary appearance in his role as Gordon Gekko.
It's a story of manipulation and betrayal, and stocks...There will most likely be a bunch of words in this movie which the average viewer won't understand, this might hurt the immersion of the movie but probably won't detract you too much from the story.One thing that makes this movie so rememberable is the characters, the acting and ofcource some of it's dialogue, it's really hard to get tired of watching Gordon Gekko delivering his at time inhumane lines.Too sum it all up;Pros:-The Acting is (aside for my dislike of Sheen) top-notch-The story, while not original is played out in a rather different fashion.The Dialogue which is also top notch.The characters in the movie are all rememberableCons:-A lot of "Wall-street" words, which some might not understand, which can make the movie less immersive.Charlie Sheen.
Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) is a big-shot in the business and soon Bud Fox is treated to the wonders of big finance, but also to it's less flattering sides.I would not call this movie a masterpiece (like some people do).
Trying to make it with the big boys on Wall Street young stock-broker Bud Fox, Charlie Sheen, has been leaving massages to his hero corporate raider Gordon Gekko's, Michael Douglas,office every day for two months to get an interview with him.
Working at a brokerage house on Wall Street is slowly draining Bud of his life and money with him going nowhere and having to worry every day if he's called into his boss' office and given his walking papers.Bud wants to be independent like the great Gordon Gekko and the only way he can do that is by having some of that Gekko charm rub off on him by being a member of his team.
Charlie Sheen as Bud Fox is perfect as the up and coming Wall Street Whiz Kid who's being used by his mentor, Gordon Gekko, to make the big bucks and then, if the time comes, take the fall for him.
Martain Sheen is also perfect as Bud's dad, he is in real life, and the person who put his star struck and confused son straight on what Gekko's intentions really are and not to fall for his line of BS about caring for the working people of America.There's also Terence Stamp as Sir Larry Wildman Gekko's biggest rival on the street who together with Gekko makes the world of corporate raiders look like the dog-eat-dog world that it really was back then in the 1980's and even now: A world where human feelings are as scarce as greed is plentifully..
"Greed, for lack of a better word, is good." This quote is said by Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas in his Oscar- winning, trademark performance), and more or less is an ethical representation of his character.
Strangely Oliver Stone thinks the worst thing of the decade was yuppie culture Charlie Sheen ( Straight from his star turn from PLATOON ) plays Bud Fox the hero of the story who seeing that Gordon Gekko wants to buy and asset strip his father's aircraft company goes out of his way to bring down the Gekko empire This is where I got confused .
Charlie Sheen is every bit as good here as he was in PLATOON ( Though these are probably the only two movies where he gives very good performances ) while Michael Douglas is superb as the amoral Gordon Gekko , and Terence Stamp and Martin Sheen are always worth watching , and considering the movie mainly revolves around a bunch of people in offices making as much money as they can the story is compelling in parts.
Wall Street takes that same template - and the same leading man, Charlie Sheen - and applies it to 1980s corporate America, again with a more personal connection for Stone: his father Lou was a stockbroker during the 1929 market meltdown, and the filmmaker dedicated his attack on capitalism to his recently deceased parent.Not surprisingly, father figures play a major part in the movie's script, as the young and ambitious Bud Fox (Sheen), a young broker who, in his desperate quest for the top, is torn between the values of his father Carl (the actor's real-life dad Martin), a blue-collar union president, and those of his personal hero, one Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas), whose ethos is best summed up by the famous phrase "Greed, for want of a better word, is good".
Its sharp look at the more cynical attitude of the '80s remains very relevant to this day, adding to the timeless feel of the story while at the same time grounding the content in a very specific context, paving the way for some heavy criticism of the yuppie mentality (see also a rather different take on the matter, namely Bret Easton Ellis' ferociously satirical American Psycho).And there lies the movie's greatest paradox: its open critique of quick-buck traders was (and is) misinterpreted by people who claim to have begun a Wall Street career because of the Gekko character, an ironic fact since he's the "villain" of the piece.
Basically, it is the working out of a moral struggle within young Wall Street trader Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) between the values with which he was raised of hard work and success through actual creation, versus those of his mentor Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) who succeeds through corporate raiding and "creative destruction".
Michael Douglas is so bad that he is so good in his role as Gordon Gekko in "Wall Street." With this performance, I can see why he is an academy award winner.I must give credit to Charlie Sheen for his part of making "Wall Street" a success.
Michael Douglas or i should say Gordon Gekko- the ruthless and greedy millionaire for whom money was everything and he showed that millionaires cant except loses and they make sure they don't get it.I have heard a saying that "SMELL OF MONEY IS REALLY BAD"and it proved right for Bud Fox. I just wonder sometimes whether there was Gordon Gekko in reality and if there was, i bow to him and really would have loved to see such a man.And thanks to Oliver Stone for making such a beautiful movie cos otherwise, people wouldn't have seen such a great actor putting himself into Gordon Gekkos shoes.
Maybe watching this back in the day would have made a greater impression, I think Gordon Gekko played by Michael Douglas is a great performance, and the green Bud Fox by Charlie Sheen fits in very nicely.I don't get the Wall Street world and never will I guess, but I can see the glamor and money and esteem by the peers if you do it well.
Oliver Stone directed this interesting drama that stars Charlie Sheen as Bud Fox, a young but ambitious stockbroker in New York whose time is taken up entirely by his job, though in off-hours he tries to impress powerful and wealthy, but also ruthless and greedy corporate raider Gordon Gekko(played by Michael Douglas, who won the Academy Award for best actor) Gordon will eventually take Bud under his wing, and guides him to helping Gordon get inside information he can use, which involves his father Carl(played by his own father Martin Sheen) who ends up feeling betrayed by this, and Bud's life will spiral out-of-control as the authorities threaten to indict him if he won't testify against Gekko in court...
If you can get past Charlie Sheen's Bud Fox, ignore Daryl Hannah's lack of talent and just Oliver Stone (in general) what you have left is one of the greatest screen characters in power broker Gordon Gekko.
Charlie Sheen plays Bud Fox a very young stock broker wanting to make it big time in the Wall Street world.
That film was WALL STREET, released in late 1987, and extremely timely in its day as it came out shortly after what was then the biggest financial crash in America since 1929.There's no real need to recite too much of the plot details, only to say that a hotshot young stockbroker (Charlie Sheen) falls under the spell of corporate raider Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas, in a steely performance that rightly won him the Best Actor Oscar for 1987) and thus sells out everything about himself, including the pride of his own father (Martin Sheen), for the love of money and greed.
Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.¨Oliver Stone's Wall Street is a memorable film with some great performances from Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen.
I'm no expert in economy, but I still found this movie very interesting thanks to a good screenplay written by Stone and Stanley Weiser, and some great performances from the cast (excepting Daryl Hannah who was miscast in this film).Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) is a young stockbroker who is having a difficult time making it to the top of the firm he is working for.
Michael Douglas is at his best playing Gordon and the scene where he gives the speech about money and greed is just memorable, Charlie Sheen is also great in his role as an aspiring stockbroker who wants to succeed in what he does.