But if there’s a flaw in the movie, it’s in how dashing Douglas’ character is.
“The idea that Gekko was this shiny, beautifully dressed, magnetic, charismatic superstar suited a lot of people in the business world very nicely,” says screenwriter Stephen Schiff, who’s writing a sequel to the movie.
Although Bud Fox ultimately turns against him and Gekko heads to jail, the character’s charisma undercuts the film’s moralizing.
“What do you want to be coming out of the movie? Do you want to be Bud Fox, broken and downtrodden and never having quite made it?” asks Schiff. “Or do you want to be Gordon Gekko, who, yeah he’s going to jail, but what a swashbuckler he was until the very last moment?”
Both Douglas and Stone have said that a lot of young people they meet see Gekko as a role model. But George David Smith, a business historian who teaches at NYU’s Stern School, says that Gekko is definitely not a capitalist hero. Gekko, says Smith, would have more trouble operating today because regulators pursue that kind of manipulation more aggressively.
Audiences may get a chance to see how Gekko would fare in today’s economy. A sequel to Wall Street, called Money Never Sleeps, is in the works.
Evil characters are appealing only in literature. In true life, they are a real drag to be around.
One of (I think) C.S. Lewis’ criticisms of Milton’s [i] Paradise Lost, [/i] was that in this work, Satan is too interesting a character. We must not think of the real Satan as one Grand, Scheming, Diabolical-but-Cool Dude. Rather, Evil is disgusting and ultimately [i] boring. [/i]
Let’s see, Gekko or Fox? How about this, instead: I want to be an NPR pasha…
Wilfred,
Actually, it has been my experience that Evil seems very cool and seductive at first. There are more Gekko’s than you would like to think. Satan isn’t boring or a real drag – at first. He can be very persuasive and make his path seem soooo reasonable and right.
Satan often appears (to me) in the guise of a fun, “forward thinking,” “realistic,” “reasonable” person at first. It is only when we are “trapped” that his true nature makes itself known.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder