Wall Street (1987, Stone)

Gordon Gekko is to greed what Willy Wonka is to chocolates. A character identifying a need. As a movie construct he is everything you and I might aspire to be at some point - rich, in control and very, very powerful. He is so on the edge that he even keeps a blood pressure monitor on his desk at all times. Oliver Stone's film has become a legendary time capsule for a period (the bullish, bustling 80's) and for its endlessly quotable dialogues:

"There's no nobility in poverty anymore".

"It's not a question of enough, pal. It's a zero sum game, somebody wins, somebody loses. Money itself isn't lost or made, it's simply transferred from one perception to another."

"It's all about the bucks kid, the rest is conversation".

But most of all for rationalizing our need for more with the now legendary "Greed is good" line. These and other pieces of spoken dialogue are so inspiring in their construct and situations that they might have been the drive behind a generation of Nouveau Entrepreneurs. The story is your basic rise and fall of a yuppie (Charlie Sheen) hell bent on succeeding in the big bad world of NY investments and stocks. His big catch is luring Gekko, but what he underestimates in his desire to please is Gekko's drive to amass wealth in a manner that turns a blind eye to morality and ethics. In a film about steely cold men and their wills, the warmest, truest segments are those played out between real life father and son duo of Charlie and Martin Sheen. Their delicate relationship masks a plot point that later rears itself in a way that raises the stakes and makes the film all the more better for willing to explore it.

What I liked most of all is that there is comeuppance at the end. The price for success is paid, even if everything doesn't end happily ever after. Not a great film, but very well in all conventional aspects.

Rating: 4/5