A Tense Wall Street Drama With a Top-Notch Cast
Kevin Spacey and Jeremy Irons head a marvelous ensemble cast in Margin Call (2011), an absorbing drama about a Wall Street investment firm during the 2008 financial crisis. Other actors in the movie include Paul Bettany, Simon Baker, Zachary Quinto, Demi Moore and Stanley Tucci. Writer-director J. C. Chandor makes his debut with Margin Call, a well-crafted film with strong performances and compelling dialogue. Despite the absence of action sequences, Chandor managed to inject his movie with a high level of intensity, and it's not unreasonable to describe it as a thriller.
But what makes Margin Call so fascinating is that viewers are made to feel as though they're getting an insider's look at the world of the investment banker. Chandor achieved this by creating eight well-rounded characters, all of whom are smart, hardworking employees of an unnamed financial services firm that seems to be loosely based on Lehman Brothers.
There's some jargon in Margin Call — for example, MBS for mortgage-backed securities — but it doesn't much matter whether or not you understand. The film doesn't attempt to explain the technical aspects of the 2008 financial crisis; instead, the movie focuses on capturing the personalities and mindset of the people who plunged the world into global recession.
The film is talky, but you get memorable lines, such as the firm's CEO saying, "The music is about to stop, and we're gonna be left holding the biggest bag of odorous excrement ever assembled in the history of capitalism."
The Film Gives a Realistic Depiction of People in a Workplace Crisis
Margin Call takes place at a 107-year-old investment firm with offices in a Manhattan skyscraper. As the film opens, 80 percent of the firm's personnel on the floor are being laid off and immediately escorted from the building. On his way out, a 19-year employee who has just been terminated hands a flash drive to a young analyst (Zachary Quinto) and warns him, "Be careful."
The brainy analyst works with the contents of the flash drive to develop a presentation showing that the firm has way too much of its money in high-risk mortgages, and he projects losses greater than the total value of the company. Senior management is quickly notified, and an emergency meeting of the executive committee is held around four o'clock in the morning. Chandor keeps the story taut by having everything happen within a period of about 28 hours.
The key players in the meeting are head of sales Sam Rogers (Kevin Spacey), who has been with the firm for 34 years, and CEO John Tuld (Jeremy Irons). It turns out that Rogers, Tuld and other senior executives are not surprised by the analyst's findings: they've seen the problem coming for about a year. The film goes on to show a case study in leadership as CEO Tuld exploits the amorality of his employees to get everyone on board with his plan for dealing with the situation — a plan which is legal, but repugnant.
When it's all over, Tuld tries to console Rogers by telling him, "It's just money. It's made up. Pieces of paper with pictures on it so that we don't have to kill each other just to get something to eat."
Extras
The main bonus material on the Margin Call DVD is the feature-length audio commentary by writer-director J. C. Chandor and producer Neal Dodson. They say the film was shot in 17 days, and all the scenes in which Jeremy Irons appears were shot over only three days. Ninety percent of the movie was shot at Manhattan's One Penn Plaza, a 57-story building adjacent to Penn Station and Madison Square Garden.
In addition, the DVD provides about 15 minutes of video extras.
In the six-minute "Revolving Door: Making Margin Call," we hear from a few of the actors and writer-director J. C. Chandor, as well as Jeff Chandor, the writer-director's father, who worked for 39 years at Merrill Lynch.
There are also two deleted scenes, each a little over two minutes in length. In "Inside Tips" we get to see Grace Gummer, one of Meryl Streep's daughters, play a scene with Zachary Quinto. In "Strike Quick" CEO Tuld (Jeremy Irons) delivers a speech in which he tells his employees, "There are times when the market must eat its weak."
"Missed Calls: Moments With Cast & Crew" consists of a little over a minute of footage of the film's personnel between takes, and "From the Deck: Photo Gallery" is a slideshow of production stills that is nearly four minutes in length.
DVD Release Date: December 20, 2011
Feature Film Runtime: 1 hour 47 minutes
MPAA Rating: R for Language