Wall Street is Oliver Stone's love letter to the bears and the bulls that spells out what the hell those guys in Manhattan were doing in the mid 1980's. The film revolves around young Bud Fox, a low level stock broker who not only dreams of being rich he's obsessed by it. He is able to worm his way into the inner circle of legendary tycoon Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) and ends up working on deals that will bring them millions, only in illegal ways (insider trading).Michael Douglas won a well deserved Oscar for his portrayal of Gekko, the arch stereotype of money grubbing in $2000 suits and offices with glass walls. Gekko is our Mr. Potter and Douglas plays him in a way that you like him and hate him all at the same time. Charlie Sheen is also good as Fox, the naive as hell boy who ends up way over his head and is able to somewhat dig his way out. The rest of the cast is just as exciting, except for Daryl Hannah who flat out sucks in this picture. But she was hot at the moment...
The story is a sound, almost Biblical fall from grace and redemption tale that focuses on taking the wrong path. Bud sells his soul to the devil and has to give something up to make things right. That's the basic tale. The only real complaint is based on my own ignorance of stocks and moving money. I don't understand much of the jargon that the film throws out there so some parts are difficult to follow, but when you get to the real humanity (or lack thereof) it's a splendid film that comes from the golden age of Oliver Stone. it's not his best work, but it is a very good film.
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