Rewind, Review, and Re-Rate: ‘Wall Street’: Faust’s Mephisto as a Corporate Raider

R | 2h 6m | Drama | December 11, 1987

With his suspenders, slicked-back hair, and power ties, Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) made greed look cool in 1987’s “Wall Street,” directed by Oliver Stone. Greed seems to be ramping up as of late, which is why “Wall Street” is worth a re-watch.

Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas), in Oliver Stone's "Wall Street." (20th Century Fox)

America may or may not be currently experiencing “greedflation.” Global inflation rose from 4.7 percent in 2021 to 8.8 percent in 2022, but it’s hard to say for sure whether or not it’s greedflation. There was a pandemic, a trade war, a land war, huge government spending, and a global economy that’s possibly become too complex for traditional macroeconomic theory to explain. More on this later.

Wall Street

“Wall Street” is basically an updated version of Goethe’s “Faust.” The devil (Gekko) gambles millions on America’s big and small corporations, and a lowly but ultimately honest stockbroker (Charlie Sheen) sells his soul for a piece of a multimillion-dollar illusion.

Oliver Stone, who dedicated the movie to his late stockbroker father, took the Faustian template and then gave it the modern twist of the villainous corporate raider, a version of which was played by Richard Gere three years later in “Pretty Woman.” In real life, politician and former businessman Mitt Romney was castigated by fellow Republican Newt Gingrich in a documentary as having “looted” corporations with his old corporate raider company, Bain Capital.

Bud Fox (Sheen) is an account executive stockbroker, chasing his dream of evolving from a small fish in a medium-sized firm to becoming an investment banker.

Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) is an account executive stockbroker, in Oliver Stone's "Wall Street." (20th Century Fox)

Bud works the phones alongside smarmy, entirely untrustworthy colleague Marv (John C. McGinley). Marv is a finance version of McGinley’s Sgt. O’Neill in 1986’s “Platoon,” which also starred Charlie Sheen and was directed by Oliver Stone.

When Bud thinks about Lou, the room’s elder (Hal Holbrook), who is a seasoned broker without the killer instinct to play in the finance big leagues, he realizes that he'd do well to add wheeler-dealer multimillionaire Gordon Gekko to his client list. That way, he can create the possibility of getting his foot in the door to the rarified world of the true finance players.

When he does finally squeeze through that door, he discovers that the dangerous Gekko doesn’t need another broker. Gekko wants Bud Fox to get prized insider information, any way he can. Information is power, insider trading is illegal, and this is the crossroads where the easy wrong meets the hard right. Fox wavers only a moment before deciding that the end will justify the means, and he signs away his soul to the devil to gain the kind of skyrocketing career that many who comes to Manhattan are after.

Billionaire Sir Larry Wildman (Terence Stamp), in "Wall Street." (20th Century Fox)

Bud’s first mission is to spy on billionaire Sir Larry Wildman (Terence Stamp), whose presence in New York almost certainly involves stocks. One underhanded tactic leads to another, and soon Bud is spilling inside information and helping Gekko take over Blue Star Airlines, where Bud’s father, Carl Fox (played by Sheen’s real-life dad, Martin Sheen), has worked for 24 years.

Gekko naturally sees it as a perfect opportunity for exploitation. True to form, he lies about his intentions for the airline. And while ruthless capitalist Gekko takes Bud under his wing, shows him the ropes,  famously instructing him in all the ways in which Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” applies to stock trading, young Fox finally sees that he may end up being responsible for the demise of his father’s firm. Which would mean massive job loss for the men he worked alongside during his summer jobs there, and ultimately include the demise of his father’s respect for him, in the Faustian bargain.

(L–R) Frank Adonis, Michael Douglas, Daryl Hannah, Charlie Sheen, and Martin Sheen in "Wall Street." (20th Century Fox)

Thoughts

One might consider the heavy Wall Street lingo that kicks in hard and fast and never lets up to be a downside of the movie, because it’s been said there’s more suspense to be had when one has a fairly solid comprehension of the stock market. I don’t entirely agree with that. In the same way that “Rounders” contains wall-to-wall poker lingo, it doesn’t much matter if you don’t understand cards.

As long as the script contains the truth (and Oliver Stone would know that from his stockbroker dad), and the actors understand what they’re doing and saying, the audience will pick up on the truth subliminally and therefore be transported emotionally as well. Michael Douglas won 1987’s Best Actor Oscar and Golden Globe, so it’s safe to say that his research for Gordon Gekko was impeccable.

Charlie Sheen and Daryl Hannah in "Wall Street." (20th Century Fox)

As for the rest of the performances, Daryl Hannah is rather unconvincing as Bud’s interior designer-girlfriend, bequeathed to him by Gekko, who gave her a career, for a price; and James Spader is in his 1980s wheelhouse of privileged prep-and-Ivy League types. Charlie Sheen’s early wheelhouse was the upscale greenhorn in for a rude awakening, and while satisfactory, he pales in comparison to his father’s work as a stalwart blue-collar union man with his workers’ best interests always at heart. Douglas steals the show from everybody as the grinning devil himself—suave, sophisticated, shrewd, cynical, ruthless, and heartless.

Roger Barnes (James Spader), a young corporate lawyer and former college roommate of Bud Fox, in "Wall Street." (20th Century Fox)

Greed

Ambition battles morality, wins, then loses. In “Wall Street,” redemption comes with probable jail time on federal charges of securities fraud.

Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen, R), doing a handcuffed walk of shame through his office, is off to jail on federal charges of securities fraud, in "Wall Street." (20th Century Fox)

But the essence of “Wall Street” is summed up in a speech that Gekko gives at a shareholders meeting of fictitious corporation Teldar Paper, which is based on a real-life corporate raider Ivan Boesky speech. (Boesky’s now barred from trading in the securities industry in America.)

“The point is, ladies and gentlemen, greed is good. Greed works. Greed is right. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed in all its forms, greed for life, money, love, knowledge, has marked the upward surge of mankind. And greed, mark my words, will save not only Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the U.S.A.”

Greedflation or Worse?

As stated at the outset, I’m not sure whether or not greedflation is at work in the times we live in: the pandemic, the trade war, the land war, and so on. More than half of Americans think the current administration has weakened the economy according to a September poll from PBS NewsHour, NPR, and Marist, and the country’s economic outlook would appear, naturally, to be shaped not just by confusing or conflicting indicators but also by politics.

Of course, there are those who claim that all the current chaos is due to the long arm of the Chinese Communist Party, which created the pandemic in the first place. Those claim that it injected the virus into America to tamper with our democratic election process and is now pulling the hidden levers rigged inside the Democratic Party’s socialist-liberalist-progressivist ideologies. Like a diabolical Decepticon, doing so will transform America’s listing ship of state into a nuclear submarine of communism.

Which is the ultimate form of greed. Watch “Wall Street” again, and contemplate where greed has gotten humans since the dawn of time.

A movie poster for "Wall Street."

‘Wall Street’ Director: Oliver Stone Starring: Michael Douglas, Charlie Sheen, Martin Sheen, Daryl Hannah, John C. McGinley, James Spader MPAA Rating: R Running Time: 2 hours, 6 minutes Release Date: Dec. 11, 1987 Rating: 4 stars out of 5