William Hurt as Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson in ‘Too Big to Fail’
In ‘Too Big to Fail’, a HBO movie based on the book of the same name by the New York Times reporter Andrew Ross Sorkin, most characters sit on the edge of their chairs. And those who are not sitting, are purposefully leaning over as if trying unsuccessfully to grab the world that is going down a financial abyss.
It is about the 2008 financial meltdown that began with the troubles of Lehman Brothers. And you know that the crises that followed Lehman were indeed one giant turd stuck in the world’s throat by the number of times billionaire CEOs use shit and crap in the same sentence.
For instance, in one scene Bill Pullman, who plays Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, says to other heavy hitters of the financial world, “Hank (as in Hank Paulson, the treasury secretary) thinks he can sell the good parts of Lehman to Barclays but someone has to take the crap that is weighing down the company. Nobody knows how much this shit is worth but somebody has to buy it to make a deal.”
Earlier in that scene Dimon also says, “Main street wants Wall Street to pay. They think we are overpaid assholes.”
In an unrelated scene early on in the movie Richard S. Fuld Jr., the chief executive of Lehman Brothers (James Woods), says “The federal government is snaking my deal? I cannot fucking believe this shit.”
If you want to know how to make financial crises stemming from such abstruse terms as credit default swaps and toxic assets thrilling, watch this movie. I did, sitting the entire time sitting on the edge of my seat. That is when I was not leaning over my desktop monitor.
Paulson, played credibly by William Hurt, is the protagonist of the movie trying to save the financial world from exploding in his face. He looks as if he would soon suffer a heart attack any moment or is already in the midst of a series of them.
As a movie about what led to the giant and politically controversial bailout of the world populated by men “whose sole job is to make money” ‘Too Big to Fail’ is entertaining. Any movie that can bring Federal Reserves chairman Ben Bernanke (Paul Giamatti) and Paulson together over the breakfast table and make them watchable has to be applauded.
