The love of money

On a recent LAX-BRI flight I watched Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, directed by Oliver Stone, and a sequel to his 1987 Wall Street. I actually disagreed with many critics and thought it was better than its predecessor. Some of it was a bit disjoint and unbelievable but what I liked and enjoyed was a few specific scenes:

* Gordon Gecko ("greed is good") giving a lecture at Fordham University warning that the market was about to melt-down because of all the dodgy mortgages that banks had taken on. He captures well the greed and folly that led to this.

* A twenty-something son [an investment banker] "parenting" his mother by setting boundaries. Telling her he won't give her money to bail out her silly real estate deals, she should go back to her husband, and go back to nursing, a real job where she makes a difference in the lives of people.

* Gordon Gecko's line: "It is not about the money; it is about the game."

I thought scenes such as these gave the movie some real substance, whereas the original movie just showed how an ambitious young trader got burned because of his greed.