Oliver Stone's follow-up to his Wall Street original sees Michael Douglas reprise his role as Gordon Gekko — but this time minus his braces and looking as if he has just survived a spin in a tumble-drier as he staggers out of clink.
The fabled corporate raider is determined to find his estranged daughter and rectify the mistakes in his life.
So, in a mere flash of screen time that moves us forward some years, he has penned a tome called Is Greed Good? and is busy selling it to eagerly applauding young financial whizzkids.
They include Shia LaBeouf’s Jake, a smart young trader who spends a lot of time in bed with Gekko’s long-lost daughter Winnie (Carey Mulligan).
The sequel is thus two things at once — a treatise on the worldwide recession and a story about the three principals. Whether it works as well as its predecessor depends upon your outlook on money and romance.
If it’s the former that intrigues you be warned that you need to be a potential member of the Stock Exchange to follow some parts of the tale, which involve Jake’s firm going bust and Gekko offering to help him out in return for a rapprochement with his daughter.
True, the financial parts of this smartly made, sharply written film have the benefit of some notable cameos.
Frank Langella is marvellous as Jake’s broken boss and throws himself under a train far too early for my liking, while Josh Brolin makes an able Wall Street kingpin up to every dodge in the book.
These performances sustain the interest, while Mulligan confirms the promise of An Education as she and Jake mix emotions amid the meltdown.
Stone, who has always expressed surprise that Gekko became a cult hero, here underlines the fact that his creation has the same old instincts.
We are likely to be less surprised about that than we were about the first Wall Street. Money Never Sleeps — and nor does Hollywood.
Wall Street Money Never Sleeps
