It is a performances centric movie

From my favorite movies..

disgusting, overrated, pointless

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

What I don't understand is, why the movie followed the Treasury Secretary? Why didn't it follow the Federal Reserve Chairman? Why did it show the Treasury Secretary talking and working with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York? Why Wouldn't the Federal Reserve Bank of New York's boss, the Federal Reserve Chairman, talk to and work with him? Also, the Federal Reserve Chairman spent his academic career studying the (previous) Great Depression. He would have the best understanding of what to do.

"Wall street has a gambling problem and the government keeps covering their losses. They never learn anything." In 2008 the United States economy began to crumble. Bank after bank began to fail and Lehman Brothers (the 4th largest) was on the ropes. Secretary of Treasury Hank Paulson (Hurt), Federal reserve chairman Ben Bernanke (Giamatti) and New York Fed President Tim Geithner (Crudup) all are working to try and save it. They more they find out the worse it gets and they are left with a decision to save the country or the bank. But the answer isn't as easy as it sounds. I know what your thinking. Another movie about this, hasn't there been enough? Normally I would agree but this one had Paul Giamatti so I had to watch it. This one stands far above the other ones made about the crisis and also is pretty impressive in the way it is presented. This movie made the crisis and the reasons for what was done simple enough for me to understand. Unlike the others this one is about how the government handled it and not the Wall Street CEO's which is why I didn't want to throw stuff at the TV as much. This movie was all the more impressive in the way that it really made the government the good guy in this whole mess and made you side with them. Which is almost impossible to do these days. This to me has been the best movie made about the crisis. Overall, if you watch one movie about the meltdown and the economic crisis make it this one. I recommend this. I say A.

As we start watching this film, that plays like a documentary, we are given an introduction as to what caused the debacle in the United States economy system prior to the demise of the powerhouse Lehman Brothers. The US economy almost collapse because of the same people that became obscenely rich while the party was going on, were reluctant in fixing the main problem, as well as their responsibility in creating what led to its almost collapse. Unfortunately, after all was said and done, things remained the same because even though the government, led by then Treasury secretary Henry Paulson, decided to inject cash for the banks to continue lending money to the industries and businesses that depended on it, the little people that did not have the power of the more powerful elite to continue operating were the ones that suffered the most. On a positive note, the figure of Warren Buffet, the oracle of Omaha, comes out as the most level headed individual of all. He is a humble man when it comes to show off his wealth. In fact, the film shows him as the simple, unassuming person that he is. It is humbling for someone like Hank Paulson to seek advice from this great man that had a clear picture about the excesses the men at the center of the story had committed.Curtis Hanson directed the HBO film, based on a novel of Andrew Ross Sorkin, with a screenplay by Peter Gould. The high financing world is examined by the filmmakers, trying to make sense about the fateful year of 2008. The best thing they achieved was the almost perfect match in the casting to play on the screen the principals involved in the story. The film requires a certain knowledge to follow the intricacies of that world, something that is not easily grasped by the general public.William Hurt shines as Hank Paulson, the man at the center of the storm. We watch him walking up Seventh Avenue in Manhattan looking at what was Lehman Brothers' headquarters. Others in the film are Billy Crudup as Timothy Geithner. Paul Giamatti playing the bearded, and somber, Ben Bernanke. As Paulson's Treasury team there are wonderful performances by Cinthia Nixon, Joey Slotnick, Topher Grace and Ayan Akhtar. Almost all the other actors have only limited time in front of the camera, but their collective effort is notable.

And it is a disaster movie, with the unfortunate happenstance of being completely true.I would say that this is an actors piece, most definitely, with not a poor performance (although some perhaps hackneyed) within.I would also say that, since it's a disaster movie, we might have been given some more of that disaster at the death ... instead of the horrible thing said twice to make it mean more.You should watch this, and make everyone else that you know watch it. Let them know how close we came, and how close we are right now, to complete disaster.