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Inside Job (2010 film)

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Inside Job
Directed byCharles Ferguson
Produced byAudrey Marrs
Charles Ferguson
Narrated byMatt Damon
CinematographySvetlana Cvetko
Kalyanee Mam
Edited byChad Beck
Adam Bolt
Music byAlex Heffes
Distributed bySony Pictures Classics
Release dates
  • May 16, 2010 (2010-05-16) (Cannes)
  • October 8, 2010 (2010-10-08) (United States)
Running time
1:48:49 minutes
CountryTemplate:Film US
LanguageEnglish
Budget$2 million[1]
Box office$7.3 million [2]

Inside Job (2010) is a documentary film about the financial crisis of 2007–2010 directed by Charles H. Ferguson. The film was screened at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2010 and won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2011.[3]

Ferguson has described the film as being about "the systemic corruption of the United States by the financial services industry and the consequences of that systemic corruption."[4] In five parts the film explores how changes in the policy environment and banking practices helped create the 2008 financial crisis. Inside Job was well received by film critics who praised its pacing, research and exposition of complex material.

Synopsis

The subject of Inside Job is the global financial crisis of 2008. It features research and extensive interviews with financiers, politicians, journalists, and academics. The film follows a narrative that is split into five parts.

The film focuses on changes in the financial industry in the decade leading up to the crisis, the political movement toward deregulation, and how the development of complex trading such as the derivatives market allowed for large increases in risk taking that circumvented older regulations that were intended to control systemic risk. In describing the crisis as it unfolded, the film also looks at conflicts of interest in the financial sector, many of which it suggests are not properly disclosed. The film suggests that these conflicts of interest affected credit rating agencies as well as academics who receive funding as consultants but do not disclose this information in their academic writing, and that these conflicts played a role in obscuring and exacerbating the crisis.

A major theme is the pressure from the financial industry on the political process to avoid regulation, and the ways that it is exerted. One conflict discussed is the prevalence of the revolving door, whereby financial regulators can be hired within the financial sector upon leaving government and make millions.

Within the derivatives market, the film contends that the high risks that began with subprime lending were transferred from investors to other investors who, due to questionable rating practices, falsely believed that the investments were safe. Thus, lenders were pushed to sign up mortgages without regard to risk, or even favoring higher interest rate loans, since, once these mortgages were packaged together, the risk was disguised. According to the film, the resulting products would often have AAA ratings, equal to U.S. government bonds. The products could then be used even by investors such as retirement funds who are required to limit themselves to the safest investments.

Another point is the high pay in the financial industry, and how it has grown in recent decades out of proportion to the rest of the economy. Even at the banks that failed, the film shows how bank executives were making hundreds of millions of dollars in the period immediately up to the crisis, all of which was kept, again suggesting that the risk/benefit balance has been broken.

One topic which few others have addressed is the role of academia in the crisis. Ferguson notes, for example, that Harvard University economist, and former head of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Ronald Reagan, Martin Feldstein, was a director of the insurance company AIG and former board member of the investment bank J.P. Morgan & Co..

Ferguson also notes that many of the leading professors and leading faculty members of the economics and business school establishments often derive large proportions of their incomes from either engaging as consultants, or speaking engagements. For example, current dean of the Columbia Business School, Glenn Hubbard received a large percentage of his annual income from either acting as a consultant or through speaking engagements. Hubbard was also affiliated with KKR and BlackRock Financial. Hubbard as well as current chair of Harvard's department of economics, John Y. Campbell, deny the existence of any conflict of interest between academia and the banking sector.

The film ends by contending that despite recent financial regulations, the underlying system has not changed; rather the remaining banks are only bigger, while all the incentives remain the same, and not a single top executive has been prosecuted for their role in the global financial meltdown.

Production

Inside Job was produced by Audrey Marrs with Jeffrey Lurie and Christina Weiss Lurie as executive producers. The directors of photography were Svetlana Cvetko and Kalyanee Mam.

Ferguson, who is personal friends with economist Nouriel Roubini and financial writer Charles R. Morris (both of whom warned about impending economic disturbances), was concerned about instability in the financial sector since well before the crash in autumn 2008. Shortly after Lehman Brothers collapsed in September 2008, Ferguson decided to focus on this crisis as his next documentary. After a few weeks of deliberation, he approached Sony Pictures Classics who agreed to provide about half of the $2 million production budget. After the project was approved, about six months of exhaustive research began. Filming and interviewing started in spring of 2009.

The film starts in Iceland, where a similar process of financial deregulation with a subsequent asset bubble was followed by a banking collapse. The aerial footage of landscapes were not shot by Ferguson but licensed from the Icelandic documentary Draumalandið, whose co-director Andri Magnason was also interviewed.

The movie's main plot then starts in the United States with an intro credits montage introducing some of the interviewees mixed with extensive aerial shots of New York City. This segment, half-seriously described by Ferguson as a rock video, features Peter Gabriels' hit song "Big Time" prominently. Ferguson described the licensing process for the title in the director's commentary as an "agonizing experience" and estimated that the licensing fee amounted to five percent of the total budget (about $100,000).

Alex Heffes composed the music and Matt Damon narrated. The song "Congratulations" by MGMT is featured during the ending credits.

Reception

The film has received very positive reviews, earning a 98% "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes website, which compiles reviews from multiple critics.[5] One viewer-reporter characterized the film as "rip-snorting [and] indignant [with] support from interviews with Nouriel Roubini, Barney Frank, George Soros, Eliot Spitzer, Charles R. Morris and others. But the most effective presence," he continues, "may be the trusted voice of all-American actor Matt Damon, who narrates the furious takedown of the financial services and the government. It's a fairly bold move by the actor."[6]

It was selected for a special screening at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival. A reviewer writing from Cannes characterized the film as "a complex story told exceedingly well and with a great deal of unalloyed anger. [It] lays out its essential argument, cogently and convincingly, that the 2008 meltdown was avoidable. Less familiar faces, including a brothel madam and a therapist who each catered to Wall Street in the bubble years are also seen, and the movie ends not long after Robert Gnaizda, formerly with the Greenlining Institute, a housing advocacy group, characterizes the Obama administration as 'a Wall Street government', a take Mr. Ferguson clearly endorses."[7]

The American Spectator's conservative analysis of Inside Job concludes that the strong liberal-bias of the director, narrator, and actors are obvious.[8]

Awards

Award Date of ceremony Category Recipient(s) Result
Academy Awards[9] February 27, 2011 Best Documentary Feature Charles H. Ferguson and Audrey Marrs Won
Chicago Film Critics Association Awards[10] December 20, 2010 Best Documentary Feature Nominated
Gotham Independent Film Awards[11] November 29, 2010 Best Documentary Nominated
Las Vegas Film Critics Society Awards[12] December 16, 2010 Best Documentary Film Nominated
Online Film Critics Society Awards[13] January 3, 2011 Best Documentary Nominated
Phoenix Film Critics Society Awards[14] December 28, 2010 Best Documentary Feature Nominated
Writers Guild of America Awards[15] February 5, 2011 Best Documentary Screenplay Won
Directors Guild of America Awards[16] December 29, 2010 Best Documentary Won

See also

References

  1. ^ Adam Lashinsky interviews Charles Ferguson regarding 'Inside Job' at the Commonwealth Club (March 2, 2011). Retrieved on March 22, 2011.
  2. ^ Box Office Mojo
  3. ^ http://movies.yahoo.com/news/movies.ap.org/list-83rd-annual-oscar-winners-ap
  4. ^ "Charlie Rose Interviews Charles Ferguson on his documentary 'Inside Job'", February 25, 2011
  5. ^ "Inside Job Movie Reviews, Pictures". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
  6. ^ Hill, Logan (May 16, 2010). "Is Matt Damon's Narration of a Cannes Doc a Sign that Hollywood is Abandoning Obama?". [[New York (magazine)|]]. Retrieved May 16, 2010. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  7. ^ Dargis, Manohla (May 16, 2010). "At Cannes, the Economy Is On-Screen". The New York Times. Retrieved May 17, 2010. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  8. ^ "The American Spectator".
  9. ^ "Nominees for the 83rd Academy Awards". Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
  10. ^ "Chicago Film Critics Awards - 2008-2010". Chicago Film Critics Association. Retrieved January 26, 2010.
  11. ^ Adams, Ryan (October 18, 2010). "2010 Gotham Independent Film Award Nominations". awardsdaily.com. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
    Adams, Ryan (November 29, 2010). "20th Anniversary Gotham Independent Award winners". awardsdaily.com. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
  12. ^ Adams, Ryan (December 16, 2010). "The Las Vegas Film Critics Society Awards". awardsdaily.com. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
  13. ^ Stone, Sarah (December 27, 2010). "Online Film Critics Society Nominations". awardsdaily.com. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
    Stone, Sarah (January 3, 2011). "The Social Network Named Best Film by the Online Film Critics". awardsdaily.com. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
  14. ^ "Phoenix Film Critics Name THE KINGS SPEECH Best Film of 2010". Phoenix Film Critics Society. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
  15. ^ "Writer's Guild of America 2011 Nominations". Writers Guild of America. Retrieved February 6, 2011.
  16. ^ "DGA 2011 Award Winners Announced". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved January 29, 2011.
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