Eye-opening ‘Big 
Short’ distressing

FILM REVIEW

Odd and self-aware 
film follows 2008 

financial crisis

By MADELEINE GAUDIN

Daily Arts Writer

A group of angry Wall Street 

traders predicting and profiting 
off the 2008 economic recession 
doesn’t scream 
entertainment, 
but 
writer 

and 
director 

Adam 
McK-

ay’s (“Anchor-
man”) “The Big 
Short” 
makes 

for an honest 
and captivating 
tale of greed, 
lies and devas-
tation.

The film stars some of Hol-

lywood’s most handsome men 
with some of the world’s ugli-
est haircuts. As bankers and 
traders, they predict the crash 
through careful analysis of the 
housing market as early as 2005 
and decide they can profit by 
betting banks that the loans 
they have given out will default.

Initially, ”The Big Short” 

reads as a documentary narrat-
ed by Ryan Gosling’s (“Drive”) 
character Jared Vennett (which 
begs the question: why doesn’t 
Ryan Gosling narrate docu-
mentaries?). While the camera 
cuts rapidly through stills from 
music videos, ‘for sale’ signs 
and celebrity mug shots, Jared 
introduces 
the 
audience 
to 

the world of 2005 Wall Street. 
It’s patchy and quick, moving 
quickly between images in a 
way that resembles memory. In 

fact, the whole movie is filmed 
like a memory. Long scenes 
are broken up by quick slides 
of images, much like how one 
might remember a year in their 
life.

Although the subject seems 

out of place compared to McK-
ay’s 
previous 
work 
(mostly 

absurdist Will Ferrell com-
edies), “The Big Short” is pep-
pered with humor even in its 
slower moments. Steve Carell 
(“Foxcatcher”), the film’s come-
dy veteran, carries much of that 
comedic weight, employing the 
painful but funny style of com-
edy reminiscent of his character 
on “The Office,” Michael Scott. 
However, Gosling holds his 
own with a sharp wit and mean 
deadpan. The humor is dark, 
but it serves as a cutter for the 
film’s heavy technical jargon 
and darker moral undertones.

“The Big Short” sets itself up 

to be a movie with a powerhouse 
ensemble cast, but the characters 
come across more as independent 
entities rather than one cohesive 
unit. Christian Bale (“The Dark 
Knight Rises”) plays an oddball 
neurosurgeon-turned-trader, 
Michael Burry, who is the first 
to discover the housing market’s 
dirty little secret. He delivers 
one of the film’s strongest perfor-
mances, but unfortunately does 
not share the screen with any of 

the other leads. While they all 
deliver strong performances on 
their own, the actors fail to unify 
as an ensemble in the way that’s 
expected in a story without one 
single lead.

The film is odd and self-aware 

in a way that comes off as endear-
ing rather than nervous. McKay 
knows that one of his greatest 
obstacles is the public’s ignorance 
or misunderstanding of the com-
plex systems that led to both the 
creation and the burst of the loan 
bubble behind the 2008 financial 
crisis. Because a film can’t have 
footnotes and working definitions 
into conversation is unnatural, 
McKay uses short star-studded 
asides to explain the terminology 
needed to understand and fully 
appreciate the film. Synthetic 
CDOs and mortgage security 
were never sexy until explained 
by Anthony Bourdain and Selena 
Gomez. In this regard, the film 
seems aware of its role as an edu-
cational tool. It’s important for 
the American people to under-
stand the biggest economic crisis 
of (most) of their lifetimes and 
McKay seems to argue that learn-
ing about it can be fun too.

“The Big Short” isn’t “The Wolf 

of Wall Street” and it wants to 
make that point clear right away. 
Choosing Margot Robbie (“The 
Wolf of Wall Street”) as the bomb-
shell cameo who explains mort-
gage bonds in a bubble bath can 
only be seen as a nod to the 2013 
Wall Street blockbuster. How-
ever, “The Big Short” goes beyond 
the glam and scam of its prede-
cessor to get at the heart of this 
kind of banking — working class 
Americans. In on of the film’s 
final scenes, Carell’s character, 
Mark Baum, debates not selling 
his credit default swaps because 
he is disgusted with himself and 
the banks whose greed pushed 
the loan bubble to burst.

The ending of “The Big Short” 

is as satisfying as it is unsettling. 
After spending two hours fol-
lowing the ups and downs of the 
characters, it’s rewarding to see 
Gosling kiss a $47 million check. 
But then the camera cuts to a 
family living out of their car in a 
gas station parking lot after los-
ing their home in the recession. 
And therein lies the great tragedy 
that “The Big Short” manages to 
uncover — for some people the 
housing market crash of 2008 
was the best thing that ever 
happened to them, but for the 
over 6 million Americans who 
lost their homes that year, it was 
the worst thing that ever hap-
pened to them.

“The Big Short” isn’t flashy or 

glamorous, but it is eye opening. 
It gives its audience an inside 
look into the corruption of Wall 
Street while still applauding the 
oddballs and eccentrics who 
are willing to take risks and go 
against the grain.

PARAMOUNT PICTURES

“Leave me alone to die.”

A-

The Big 
Short

Paramount 
Pictures

Rave & Quality 16

“The Big Short” 
isn’t “The Wolf 
of Wall Street.”

The ending is as 
satisfying as it is 
 

unsettling.

MOVE MOVIE

“Who cares if I’m pretty if I fail my finals?!”

By REBECCA LERNER

Daily Film Editor

Film is full of clichés about 

female friendships. For every 
instance of reality in movies like 
“Mean Girls” 

and 
“A 

League of Their 
Own,” 
there’s 

a case of boy-
friend stealing 
or mud-fighting 
that 
crumbles 

the 
feminine 

identity 
into 

ugly 
stereo-

types. But the female-driven 
“Breathe,” directed by “Inglori-
ous Bastards” star Mélanie Lau-
rent, never delves into cliché, 
instead dissecting the intimacy 
and complexity of the relation-
ships of adolescent girls.

“Breathe” opens on the timid 

Charlie (Joséphine Japy, “My 
Way”), a French teenage girl 
with parents who are too busy 
with a vicious cycle of breaking 
up and getting back together to 
pay any attention to her. Char-
lie’s suburban life is a drab series 
of school and childhood friends 
until a cleaving occurs. This 
cleaving, is her instantaneous 
connection with the beautiful 
and enigmatic new girl, Sarah 
(Lou de Laâge, “The Wait”).

Sarah and Charlie swiftly 

become inseparable. They are an 
unlikely pairing, as Sarah’s sta-
tus as the epitome of a “cool girl” 
is acutely juxtaposed with Char-
lie’s awkward reticence. Sarah 
exudes confidence while she 
brags of living in exotic places 
with her saintly but absent relief 
worker mother. She immedi-
ately charms Charlie and breaks 
the rhythm of her monotonous 
life. But behind the cigarette 
smoke and mirrors of glamorous 
French clubs, Sarah has a streak 
of cruelty. It’s subtle at first — we 
see it in Laurent’s cinematogra-
phy, the way the camera lingers 
on Sarah as she makes decisions 
about who to socially persecute. 
She ruthlessly ices out Charlie’s 
childhood best friend and per-
fects the powerful art of making 
Charlie feel like her best friend 
and the most important person 
in her life.

This dubious love is abruptly 

altered during a vacation to the 
countryside when Charlie makes 
the fatal mistake of introduc-
ing Sarah as a classmate, rather 
than a friend. After this rather 
small incident, their relationship 
transforms into the vacillating 
hot and cold state of frenemies. 
Sarah becomes gruesome in her 
malice because of the affection 
she so tenderly displays after-
wards. We follow Charlie on the 
roller coaster of Sarah’s love, 
which takes both of them to plac-

es neither could have imagined.

Though more famous for her 

onscreen work, Laurent is no 
stranger to screenwriting and 
directing. “Breathe” is her sec-
ond feature film. Her first, “The 
Adopted,” came out in 2011. 
Though similar in both style and 
subject matter, “Breathe” shows 
great promise for the actress-
turned-filmmaker. Laurent’s dis-
tinctly French style of delicacy 
and focus on the small and regu-
lar aspects of life are honed in 
“Breathe” and create the sense of 
urgency surrounding the film’s 
toxic relationship.

But 
Laurent’s 
successful 

choices for “Breathe” aren’t lim-
ited to camerawork — they also 
extend to her choice of actors. 
Both performances — de Laâge’s 
seductive nature as the venom-
ous Sarah and Japy’s transfor-
mation of Charlie from a naïve 
girl to a mysterious woman — are 
breathtaking.

“Breathe” is a film that is 

unafraid to redefine and break 
the schemas we have of teenage 
girls and their relationships. It 
doesn’t fit nicely into a category 
— there is humor and love, but 
there is also unbearable dark-
ness that will get under your skin 
and make you think about it for 
days. In its beauty and grotesque 
harshness, “Breathe” captures 
the true essence of teenage 
girls and relationships.

Promising ‘Breathe’

BØRNS at Shelter: 
A love letter to fans

By CHRISTIAN KENNEDY 

and CARLY SNIDER

Daily Music Editor and Daily Arts 

Writer

The Shelter is small, dense 

and dark. Exposed ceiling beams 
and black support beams give 
the space an air of raw authen-
ticity — just the way a venue for 
the arts ought to unfold to its 
audience. BØRNS graced the 
basement of St. Andrew’s Hall 
in Detroit on Wednesday night, 
enchanting the small crowd 
with his long brown locks and 
delicate vocals. Not dissimilar 
to the main attraction, Phases 
prepped the crowd by filling 
the room with a flirty, jump-
ing sound as the second of two 
openers.

The young crowd seemed 

unable to contain its excitement, 
though, bursting out in waves of 
cheers every few minutes while 
waiting for the Michigan native 
to take the stage. Stepping onto 
the small stage with his band, 
BØRNS opened with “Dug My 
Heart” and was almost entirely 
eclipsed by the shouts, applause 
and singing voices of the crowd. 
Whether it was an elongated 
tone of the keyboard, a smatter-
ing of conversation from the per-
formers or a few quick strums of 
a guitar, there was never a silent 
moment.

This lack of intimacy is 

uncommon for a venue as small 
as The Shelter, but it was made 
up for with the performance and 
few utterances by BØRNS him-
self. His body language — rais-
ing a quivering arm above his 
head or bending to croon over 
the masses in front of him — told 
the crowd that he is completely 

consumed in his art. Describ-
ing the crowd as “beatific bod-
ies and glorious spirits,” BØRNS 
brought out the more sensual 
and warm underlying tones of 
his music. He described his audi-
ence as an ocean and dedicated 
“Overnight Sensation” to the 
crowd by describing the tune as 
“a love letter from me to you.”

Wrapping up the evening 

with an encore performance 
of “Bennie and the Jets” and 
“Seeing Stars,” BØRNS flexed 
his musical muscle. By ending 
with one of his singles from his 
first EP, he was able to show how 
far he has come as an artist in 
such a short period of time. And, 
judging by the passion of his fans 
and the musical mastery shown 
on Wednesday, there is nothing 
stopping him from continuing to 
do so.

— Carly Snider

***

I 
googled 
the 
word 

“pretentious” as I attempted 
to gather my reeling thoughts 
surrounding BØRNS’s set at The 
Shelter on Wednesday. I googled 
the word “pretentious” because 
I realized the impossibility of 
talking about BØRNS without 
sounding pretentious.

pre·ten·tious: 
adjective 
1. 

attempting to impress by affect-
ing greater importance, talent, 
culture, etc., than is actually 
possessed.

I then googled “tentious” 

because I was curious if there 
was 
a 
semantically-relat-

ed word for “impressing by 
affecting importance, talent, 
culture etc., that is actually 
possessed.” That would be how 
to best describe the experi-

ence of BØRNS. His set, almost 
entirely pulled from his debut 
album, Dopamine, elevated the 
basement of St. Andrew’s Hall, 
effectively neutralizing the hot 
air into soft coolness mimicked 
by the crowd’s sways, subtle 
arm waves and smiling faces. 
The electro-pop sound crafted 
by the Michigan native feels 
like a concept album. Each track 
touches on a different subtle-
ty in the emotional love story 
crafted between its narrator 
and subject.

In some cases it was a love 

letter from BØRNS to the crowd 
with 
“Overnight 
Sensation.” 

Set opener “Dug My Heart” is 
easily overlooked between the 
musical-liquid 
hybrid 
magic 

of “10,000 Emerald Pools” and 
the soaring vocals of “Electric 
Love” on the LP, but live the 
track’s drum beats vibrated 
throughout the room, priming 
the crowd for what was to fol-
low. The repetition in “Dopa-
mine” built the crowd a tiny bit 
closer to euphoria, and the funk 
of “The Fool” kept the spirit 
high.

Each song further built up the 

bubble created by BØRNS’s sin-
gular, listener-engulfing sound 
so much that when the time 
came for his two-song encore 
of a “Bennie and the Jets” cover 
and “Seeing Stars,” the crowd, 
band and BØRNS himself felt 
fluid in an evening of ecstatic 
percussion and smooth delivery.

It’s OK that I sound preten-

tious writing about BØRNS. I 
use smooth language and vibe-y 
diction to describe the concert, 
but in the end it’s BØRNS with 
the “importance, talent and cul-
ture” to back me up.

— Christian Kennedy

FILM REVIEW

CONCERT REVIEW

B+

Breathe

Move Movie

Available on 

iTunes

6A — Wednesday, January 6, 2016
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

