I went into this movie with a negative attitude. I originally didn't want to see it and I feel a need to explain why. The problem I had with this movie from the beginning was Justin Timberlake. Now, before I get crucified for hating on Justin Timberlake, let me make my case.
Honestly, he's won me over as an actor. I like the guy. I know he got his stardom in a boy band. And then he switched over into acting. I don't begrudge the guy. You can't be a 30 year old man trying to catch the tween demographic. I'm not complaining he branched out. He's a very talented guy and he's not a bad actor. My problem with Justin Timberlake is that, for whatever reason, I think he chooses really bad movies. I wasn't a fan of Friends With Benefits, I HATED In time, and the less I think about Yogi Bear the better. The movies of his I liked were The Social Network and Trouble With the Curve. And both of those movies had Timberlake in a supporting role. And I didn't really like Trouble With the Curve all that much.
So when I saw that Timberlake was the lead actor, I just felt like this movie was going to suck. Not because he's a bad actor, but just because he chooses the worst movies. Seriously, if Justin Timberlake ever reads this, you are better than this.
What did I think of the movie? It's good. It's not bad, it's not great. It's good. It's just a very generic movie. It's a paint by numbers corporate intrigue movie. On the way home I was honestly trying to distinguish this from other movies just like it. In The Devil's Advocate it's about a lawyer who gets in over his head. Except in that movie there is the Devil. This movie doesn't have the Devil.
In Wallstreet it's about an ambitious guy who gets a taste of the high life and gets in over his head when the guy he works for turns out to be dirty. In this movie there's a lot more overt corruption.
So I guess as far as these movies go I liked this one more than Wallstreet but less than The Devil's Advocate.
The other thing I was thinking about on the way home was how I would change it. And I thought about what if Block, Ben Affleck's character, was actually on the level? Think about this: the vehicle of the movie was that Richie (Timberlake) had all his money stolen on an online gambling website that he worked for. He would be like a recruiter where he would find people at Princeton who wanted to gamble. The entire movie was about how everyone feels that gambling is wrong. The opening narration really spells it out: why is it okay to "invest" in the stock market or real estate, but playing poker or going to a casino is somehow immoral?
In a twist of fate that everyone sees coming, Block turns out to be a criminal. But what if he wasn't? What if he was a legitimate businessman who just has to do a lot of shady things because he's in Costa Rica and all the officials in Costa Rica are corrupt. And because all the officials in Costa Rica are corrupt and racist, the FBI is all over him because they think he's doing something illegal. So we really have all that happens in the movie, but we would have to change the ending. And now instead of a generic corporate intrigue movie, we have a movie talking about a topic that is really interesting. Now it's a movie about the cost of business, the double standard between blue collar gambling and white collar gambling. In 2013, where we see the richest people in the world gamble millions every day in the stock market, is it really any different than the working joe having a bit of fun in Las Vegas? But here in this movie we have a guy literally run out of the USA because he's running an online casino. And then we can talk about the excesses of it all. Drugs, women, rival gangs trying to muscle in, politics with corrupt officials, etc. All because this one guy wants to run a business and live the high life in paradise. Not because he wants to rob people blind in some kind of strange ponzi scheme.
I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong and what I'm proposing would be a less interesting movie. But it would be different. And when you stop to think about the laundry list of movies exactly like this one, I don't think different would be a bad thing.
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