The Stumping Ground: Inside Job review

by Matt

Remember all that stuff I said about how difficult Disney writers have it? The same thing goes for feature-length documentary filmmakers, only double it. When it deals with politics, square it. When Michael Moore is involved, add another exponent for every year since Roger & Me.

You not only have to convey accurate, factual information which satisfies the critical viewers who will comprise much of your audience, but you must also make the information compelling, weaving it into the fabric of a story. If you fail at one, the other will suffer. I feel this is the case with Inside Job.

It should all be there: political and white-collar corruption, an industry whose success is based on the very source of its eventual downfall, larger-than-life personalities exploiting an establish they themselves control. Scorsese would have a field day.¹ Instead, the film spends most of its time interrupting its uninteresting interview subjects so director Charles Ferguson can butt in with his two cents or Matt Damon can reiterate with intense narration.

The choice of Matt Damon as narrator puzzled me as I watched the film. I would never argue that Mr. Ripley isn't talented (badump tish!), but his voice doesn't carry the same fatherly authority as a Peter Coyote (Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room) or Morgan Freeman (Morgan Freeman, duh!), nor the unassumingness of Josh Brolin (The Tillman Story). We recognize him immediately as the voice of countless spies, con men, and depressed mathematicians.

Mark Whitacre records his narration for Inside Job

Usually, in a film like this, the narrator is the main drive with the interviews highlighting his points with details and anecdotes. Too often, the interviews simply reiterate Jason Bourne's previous statement or vice versa. What works in the trailer to Black Dynamite doesn't necessarily work everywhere else.

Come to think of it, much of the editing was pretty shoddy. The interview subjects always seem like they're being cut off in the middle of a thought. As I said to Jon during our podcast, it isn't uncommon for interviews to be truncated like this, but after seeing the film, I must concede that the cuts don't usually draw attention to themselves like they did here. The animations likewise tended to be very drab, simply sitting there on the screen with their smug little arrows and legends. On top of this, at least one of the interviews had a noisy lavalier microphone which kept shuffling against the subject's clothes. I can't help but resent a serious Oscar-contender that shows less attention to detail than most freshman film students.

These complaints might seem beside the point, but I don't think they are. The content of a film cannot be judged apart from its style. They are woven together. Individual elements might seem to play well enough (the heist movie opening credits sequence, the shocking congressional hearings, Elliot Spitzer's "Do I seriously have to talk about my affair again?" reaction, Ben Affleck's monologue about wanting a better life for Will), but if they can't form into a coherent whole, the film doesn't work.

Go back and listen to the podcast (we need the hits), and look at the clarifications page. The aesthetic mishandling of this information actually leads Jon to several erroneous conclusions about the truth of the film's claims. Had the film been directed with greater cohesion, had it a more focused point of view, had Ferguson actually demonstrated any interest in his subjects during the interviews, I doubt this would've been the case.

Inside Job has probably had more universal renown than any other non-fiction film in a year dominated by documentary masterpieces. It is well-researched, hard-hitting, and will be an eye-opener to most of its viewers. I dispute neither its facts, figures, or conclusions. I only wish I had gotten them from a more compelling film.