Best Finance / Business Movie or Show?

What do people here think is the best finance or business movie or TV show?

The obvious ones people usually mention are things like:

Wolf of Wall Street
Margin Call
Trading Places
Wall Street
Boiler Room
The Big Short
American Psycho
Barbarians at the Gate (the TV movie, not the book)
Dumb Money
Too Big to Fail
Glengarry Glen Ross
Thank You for Smoking (not exactly a finance movie but definitely a business one and my personal fav so I had to include it)
Rogue Trader
Arbitrage
The Hummingbird Project
Equity (2016)
Silver Bears (one that most people probably haven’t heard of)

And then for TV shows:

Industry
Succession
Billions
Bad Banks

Curious what people here think the best one is, and whether there are any good finance/business movies or shows I’m missing that are worth watching.

42 Comments
 

Greenspan's Panties

I would add Floored, which is a documentary about the transition from open outcry to digital trading. Really fun watch to see some of the characters and reactions to the switch. 

Memes aside, Wolf of Wallstreet is one of Scorese’s best. 

Scorese is at his best when he takes situations that would would be pretty dark but makes them light. Casino, Goodfellas, Wolf of Wallstreet, etc. His last couple of movies were decent, but they have a darker portrayal to them. Goodfellas and Wolf of Wallstreet are some of his best movies, but they both felt like a wild ride.

 

Industry has been killing it. First season is not great but everything after was amazing (Season 2 is my favorite).

I still wish they tone it down on all the sex scenes though. Underrated music score too. I think it blows Succession out of the water (but I also have the unpopular opinion that Succession was mostly a mid-show outside of a few stellar episodes).

 

Industry imo gets less interesting every season as it abandons the core premise and veers into "look these sexy people are pursing random careers and having sex"


Succession clears.

 

I actually think Glengarry Glen Ross edges it tbh. The Big Short obviously has a stacked cast, but the performances in Glengarry are just unreal.

Pacino as Roma is incredible, Baldwin’s “coffee is for closers” scene is one of the best monologues in any business movie, and Kevin Spacey is great as Williamson too. Then you’ve also got Jack Lemmon, Ed Harris, Alan Arkin, etc.

The Big Short probably wins on modern star power, but purely on acting I think Glengarry Glen Ross takes it.

 

Margin Call is probably the most realistic movie as it pertains to the ethical/unethical side of finance, and I think a pretty realistic depiction of the rationale of banks, albeit in an unrealistic time window(The events of the movie take place over 48 hours). 

Entourage is a great show. Pretty lackluster movie, however, but if you want to live in Agora fucking hills, a 3-week Tuscan villa vacation, then sometimes you have to take a call on a motherfucking Wednesday.

Writing
 

Big Short - most entertaining

Margin Call - most entertaining from a finance perspective 

Smartest Guys in the Room - personal favorite 

Trading Places - honorable mention, a classic

 

Surprised nobody mentioned Mad Men - I've heard it mentioned alongside Sopranos and The Wire as one of the greatest shows.  Still worth a watch these days?

 

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The only difference between Asset Management and Investment Research is assets. I generally see somebody I know on TV on Bloomberg/CNBC etc. once or twice a week. This sounds cool, until I remind myself that I see somebody I know on ESPN five days a week.
 

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