Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

It has been 23 years since Oliver Stone has invested anything into his original story and now fans are investing hard earned disposable income and time into his latest installment, Money Never Sleeps. Many loyal fans have been banking on this sequel, but maybe their money is better off sitting in a mutual fund somewhere or something.



Most sequels pick up right where the original film left off, or maybe a year or two later, however, Money Never Sleeps takes place an entire generation after the first film, which is one of the most interesting things about it. Finally, Gordon Gekko is out of prison and released into a whole different world than when he went in. Gordon is broke, lonely, and has been dropped off in the economic meltdown of 2008 and is finding out that 21st Century Wall Street is much leaner and meaner than the 1980's version.

Money Never Sleeps has enough going for it and this sequel definitely focuses more on the past life of the character who won Michael Douglas his Oscar, and attempts to derive most of the drama from the shambles of his broken relationship with his daughter; however, about halfway through Michael Douglas disappears from the film for far too long and it leaves us with Shia LaBouf talking about numbers for a big portion of the movie- boring (if I wanted numbers, I'd pay attention in my accounting class).

This movie is star studded. With actors like Frank Langella, Susan Sarandon, Josh Brolin, and of course Shia LaBouf and Michael Douglas, there is definitely no shortage of talent, but even with all these big names Money Never Sleeps can't seem to keep everybody awake. These actors are definitely capable of stirring up emotion, but this script is about as dramatic and clever as it is funny, so in other words, it's not either of those things. Money may not be able to sleep, but that doesn't mean the rest of us can't.

Oliver Stone really likes shots of New York city, as most of the scene changes are exactly that. Stone's work with the camera in this film is probably some of his most interesting work, sadly he seemed more interested in getting a shot of some sky scrappers in the sunset.

It has ben 23 years since Oliver Stone has invested anything into his original story and from seeing how this sequel turned out, he probably should have kept Gordon behind bars. Twenty-three years is a long time for a sequel so there is no excuse for this boring script. As Gordon Gekko says here,"Money is not the prime asset- time is" and Stone has committed the crime of robbing us of both.

Interest rates are low on this one. Skip it.