Money At The Movies

And we really have to start with Wall Street films.

Oh, yes.

Really showing my age now.

Well, in Wall Street, a titan of the industry, Gordon Gekko, played by Michael Douglas, essentially corrupts, turns Charlie Sheen's character, Bud Fox, to the dark side of the force.

But there's a very famous quote, which we must give you.

Well, Gecko is, he's now, he's bought into a company called Teldar Paper that's struggling a bit.

And he says in his speech, he says, greed, for lack of a better word, is good.

Greed is right.

Greed works.

Greed clarifies, cuts through and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.

And he's essentially saying that self-interest drives all progress, which is what Adam Smith said.

He talked about the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker, all those people who provide you with the products you want at the prices you need, not out of trying to help you, but because it's in their interest.

So, you know, at the... oliver stone made wall street and he he was trying to paint gecko as this you know evil character and the greed speech was like the essence of evil and yet all these mbas you know in america they loved him like you know so so that's

what it was but the slick back hair and everything remember absolutely yeah yeah the old boys club a lot of gel going on there

um But one of the big things about the film is this whole idea, and we'll come back to it in some of the other movies, of insider trading.

You know, of being aware of something that's not publicly available, but if it was, it would change the price of the company.

Charlie Sheen's character was following.

Charlie Sheen's... character his father at the beginning this is how he got in with Gecko his father was Martin Sheen his dad was actually his dad's actually his dad in the movie people kind of forget that he works for an airline that had kind of a legal issue hanging over them that Martin Sheen Told us so, but that's kind of behind us now.

His dad

was, was he head of the, his dad was, he was involved

in management.

More kind of repairs, repairing the airlines.

Yeah, he was, but he wasn't involved in the kind of, he was an organisation for the employees, was he? Oh yeah, yeah.

I think he was the trade union rep or something like that, wasn't he?

So so this suddenly, you know, Gekko realizes that he's just been given information that gives him an edge.