Inside Job (2010)

Overall Score: 8.75/10

Just over two years ago, the world's economy took a hit unlike anything it was prepared for. Since that time we have searched high and low for an excuse as to why we were so unprepared. Excuses, mind you. Not answers. Was it possible that we could have been prepared for what was to come? Better yet, could we have prevented it?

Traveling decades, continents, and industry insiders, Inside Job takes an uncompromising look at the near thirty year build up that lead to economic explosion. Despite the simplicity that could be had, Inside Job avoids walking party lines, and concentrates solely on the people whose decisions directly, or indirectly, impacted the 'modern economy.' At the same time, Inside Job is not afraid to call out those, some directly to their face, that have avoided any measure of responsibility for how the events unfolded. It is with that in mind, that Inside Job takes on the arduous task of explaining just what in the world these major corporations were doing with everyone's money.

The results: mind-boggling and logic defying. There's no simple way to explain what these company's were doing, but Inside Job does its best, using graphics and narration (Matt Damon!) to explain in the most abstract concepts. This works for the most part, but understanding it requires full concentration. Even then, Inside Job is packed with a variety of facts, dates, names, faces, deals, and just about anything else you can think of. It keeps the ball rolling, and minds engaged, but I worry that the frenetic "he did this, and then she did that, and then another guy did this" pacing will borrow a hollow passage in the viewer's ears for easy traveling into one and out the other.

If the viewer survives the onslaught of information, what remains is a melancholic sense of political resentment. Any, and all information left resonating in the mind of the viewer are not a collection of cheerful moments, or comical characters. Inside Job is void of comic relief. Instead, all that remains are the headaches, frustration, and downright shock at just how ignorant, disilusioned, self-obsessed so many of these people are. The efforts at those who tried to warn us feel frail by comparison to the incalcuable stupidity of those who ignored them.

Like most documentaries, Inside Job ends on a call to arms and it is unfortunate that it has to. There is no heroic knight charging on a gallant steed to rescue us from the day. As Inside Job points out, it is up to us take action, because those whose job it is have chosen not to.

Film Credits
Directed By: Charles Ferguson
Written By: Chad Beck and Adam Bolt