*** 10 Year Anniversary***

If you don’t already know all about this film, I’m stunned. It really is spectacular. If you haven’t seen it – yes, the rumours are true; it’s a musical. But not the kind of musical where the plot stops and you have time to go the bathroom, buy some more candy and catch up on your email before the movie gets good again. It’s the kind where (a) the songs are either short, intercut with action elsewhere, or both, and (b) the movie wouldn’t actually make sense without the songs. Also, the songs are good. You’ve heard all of them before, so if you must, you can just think of those sections as an especially well-done film clip.

This is a HIGH ENERGY movie!!! It’s frenetic and fast-moving and the visual style is manic. It is an epic, tragic romance set in sumptuous times with everything you could possibly want: comedic misunderstandings, eye candy of both genders, Moulin rouge dancers, life-and-death chase scenes, slimy villains and death. When it first came out I predicted a slew of imitations. I was wrong – presumably because no-one dared try.

Nicole Kidman’s waist has never been so small, Ewan McGregor has a startlingly good voice and the soundtrack is beyond compare. It is impossible not to watch this movie and fall in love at least a little bit. It is a story about Truth, Beauty, and above all, LOVE.

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps is the sequel to the 1987 film Wall Street. We meet Gordon Gekko (again played by ‘Greed is Good’ Douglas) as he is released from prison after serving time for insider trading and securities fraud (see Wall Street pt uno). Flash forward some years and we are introduced to young investment banker Jacob Moore (played by ‘I’m in absolutely everything now’ LaBeouf) and his girlfriend, Winnie, Gordon’s estranged daughter (Mulligan).

Jake’s mentor Louis Zabel (Frank Langella) attempts to gain a bailout for his failing company but is blocked by an old foe, the CEO of Churchill Schwartz (Brolin) – that leads to Zabel’s suicide. Soon Jake and the up-and-coming Gecko make contact and with it a bargain: if Jake helps Gecko mend his relationship with his estranged daughter, Gekko will help Jake destroy Bretton. Along the way, very expensive wackiness ensues!

The movie follows its predecessor’s beats, albeit set amid the 2008 financial crisis: tax evasion, insider trading, moral conflicts, dueling mentors, family drama and money money money! Can the supposedly reformed Gekko help Wall Street before its stock market crashes, get back his daughter and help a young man get revenge? If Michael Douglas can’t do it, nobody can!