This movie, for lack of a better word, is bad.
Some IMDb Trivia I found hilarious: "Charlie Sheen and Sean Young didn't get on at all. It got to the point where Sheen stuck a piece of paper on her back saying 'I am a c***'. No-one pointed it out to her. Furthermore, Oliver Stone later admitted that everyone involved told him Daryl Hannah was miscast, but he was too proud to replace her. This caused tension on set, particularly with Sean Young who wanted the role herself."
Following these harsh words, I would have to agree that Daryl Hannah is easily one of the worst performances I've seen in awhile (Toby Maguire in The Great Gatsby might have just been surpassed). She makes her character seem useless and contrived, which is a pity because she's supposed to be represent the essential moral ground between Fox and Gekko. It just goes to show how one awful performance can ruin so much of a film.
Also, from the opening shot of Manhattan's skyline to the ending image of a changed man ascending the steps of a towering building, Oliver Stone never really shows any regard for fundamental camera placement or movement. Most of his crash zooms and handheld attempts feel oddly amateurish and jarringly disjointed, clearly lacking the technique/pacing seen in The Wolf of Wall Street or Goodfellas.
And don't even get me started on the production design, sound design, and score. The final confrontation between the two main characters, Fox and Gekko, takes place in the middle of a an empty Central Park. No build up at all. Just the two guys, a field, and some rain.
The dialogue also sounds dubbed during most scenes, and seriously makes me wonder where its 16 million dollar budget went. I truly believe most student films have better production quality than this.
And the score? Sometimes it just comes on randomly in the middle of the scene and adds no dramatic effect at all. It really confuses me.
The script is really the only thing that I can give some praise too (Gekko's speech at Teldar Paper shareholders' meeting is brilliant writing), but even there Stone is stretching how much he can get away with. Moments of repetitive preaching, underdeveloped subplots, and cheap resolutions causes me to reconsider the story's greatness, but perhaps I'm just being too harsh.
I liked Wall Street slightly more originally out of pure pity for Michael Douglas and Martin Sheen being dragged into this mess, but then I realized not even an infinite number of good performances would ever be able to balance out Daryl Hannah's absolute atrocity of a showing.
D
Some IMDb Trivia I found hilarious: "Charlie Sheen and Sean Young didn't get on at all. It got to the point where Sheen stuck a piece of paper on her back saying 'I am a c***'. No-one pointed it out to her. Furthermore, Oliver Stone later admitted that everyone involved told him Daryl Hannah was miscast, but he was too proud to replace her. This caused tension on set, particularly with Sean Young who wanted the role herself."
Following these harsh words, I would have to agree that Daryl Hannah is easily one of the worst performances I've seen in awhile (Toby Maguire in The Great Gatsby might have just been surpassed). She makes her character seem useless and contrived, which is a pity because she's supposed to be represent the essential moral ground between Fox and Gekko. It just goes to show how one awful performance can ruin so much of a film.
Also, from the opening shot of Manhattan's skyline to the ending image of a changed man ascending the steps of a towering building, Oliver Stone never really shows any regard for fundamental camera placement or movement. Most of his crash zooms and handheld attempts feel oddly amateurish and jarringly disjointed, clearly lacking the technique/pacing seen in The Wolf of Wall Street or Goodfellas.
And don't even get me started on the production design, sound design, and score. The final confrontation between the two main characters, Fox and Gekko, takes place in the middle of a an empty Central Park. No build up at all. Just the two guys, a field, and some rain.
The dialogue also sounds dubbed during most scenes, and seriously makes me wonder where its 16 million dollar budget went. I truly believe most student films have better production quality than this.
And the score? Sometimes it just comes on randomly in the middle of the scene and adds no dramatic effect at all. It really confuses me.
The script is really the only thing that I can give some praise too (Gekko's speech at Teldar Paper shareholders' meeting is brilliant writing), but even there Stone is stretching how much he can get away with. Moments of repetitive preaching, underdeveloped subplots, and cheap resolutions causes me to reconsider the story's greatness, but perhaps I'm just being too harsh.
I liked Wall Street slightly more originally out of pure pity for Michael Douglas and Martin Sheen being dragged into this mess, but then I realized not even an infinite number of good performances would ever be able to balance out Daryl Hannah's absolute atrocity of a showing.
D