MOVIE REVIEW - Wall Street (1987)

Oliver Stone made this "the archetypal portrayal of 1980s excess", so says Wikipedia. In reality, Stone made a pretty good movie about a corrupt businessman in the '80's; but this movie in no way portrays the success of the '80s. It does portray what liberals think is the cause of '80s success - greed, corruption, and excess. But Business consists of hundreds of millions of decent people going to work every day to make ends meet and contribute to society. The fact that the '80s had good politics and successful business does not mean that most of them were corrupt - it means that business worked as it should. Obviously, there are plenty of Gordon Gekko's out there (Madoff, Fastow, Ebbers, and plenty in government), but these exceptions don't require socialist takeover of business. They just require good laws that seek out and punish corruption. Back to the movie, Charlie Sheen is too earnest; Michael Douglas doesn't have to act to play sleazy; and Oliver Stone could direct if only he weren't too often on a Marxist mission.