How realistic is Margin Call?

Margin Call does offer a highly realistic view of Wall Street firms. Characters like Paul Bettany’s hard-bitten player display the mixture of insecurity and hauteur that fuel the financial services world.

What was the problem in the movie Margin Call?

Margin Call captures a day in the life of a Lehman Brothers-like bank as it scrambles to avoid falling into the first cracks of the financial crisis. Briskly paced and marvelously acted, the movie reveals how large financial institutions operate and the motivations of the people who work within them.

Is Margin Call about Lehman Brothers?

Margin Call is Based on the collapse of Lehman Brothers during the financial meltdown of 2008. The movie depicts a realistic take on what happens inside a Wall Street firm. It is about a company that is downsizing its workers because of the firm’s crisis. One of the victims of downsizing is Eric Dale.

Is Margin Call a good film?

“Margin Call” is one of the strongest American films of the year and easily the best Wall Street movie ever made. It’s about corporate manners—the protocols of hierarchy, the rituals of power, and, most of all, the difficulty of confronting flagrant habits of speculation with truth.

What does the dog symbolize in Margin Call?

His dying dog is a metaphor for his compassion to those negatively affected by the economic crisis. The dog is used as a device to portray his empathy; the death of the dog reflects his lost moral sense, evident in his decision to stay at the firm and profit on the losses of others.

Is Margin Call based on a real bank?

Zachery Quinto, left, and Pen Bradley in Margin Call – ‘the best fictional treatment of the current economic crisis’. It’s just another day in 2008 for Margin Call’s unnamed investment bank, which is based on Lehman Brothers. Profits are down and 80% of the staff on the trading floor are being laid off.

What did the ending of margin call mean?

In the film’s ending scene, the bank’s CEO stares out over the Manhattan skyline and recounts for his junior analyst a near-epic list of the world’s financial booms and busts—dating back some 400 years. The message is clear: This has happened before, it will happen again. Human nature does not change.

Was margin call about Goldman Sachs?

Although the film does not depict any real Wall Street firm, and the fictional firm is never named, the plot has similarities to some events during the 2008 financial crisis: Goldman Sachs similarly moved early to hedge and reduce its position in mortgage-backed securities, at the urging of two employees, which …

Who is Jared Cohen in margin call?

Simon Baker
Jared Cohen (played by Simon Baker in Margin Call (2011))