Must-see movies to work in finance

Although explained in class, the daily life of employees in the world of finance, and particularly in market finance, is difficult to grasp. One way to project yourself is to watch movies that trace this hectic pace of life. Mainly focused on the 2008 subprime crisis, these films will show you how this crisis was understood and the consequences it had from the point of view of Wall Street traders, investment bank employees and US government officials. 

Check out all these films to better understand what you're getting yourself into!

Read more: 5 movies to watch as a business school student

1) The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)

A Martin Scorsese film, The Wolf of Wall Street, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, was a hit when it was released. The latter plays a stockbroker who was convicted of stock market fraud. Although grandiose, this film traces the lives of Wall Street traders and financial professionals and the hectic pace of their daily lives. With astronomical amounts of likes and activities, endless work hours and more than a little pressure, this film is a good representation of the excesses of the financial world, as well as the consequences of greed in this field. 

2) The Big Short (2015)

The film The Big Short retraces the crime of the Subprimes. It features Christian Bale, a trader who anticipated the crisis before anyone else and therefore reacted accordingly. He decided to "short" all his financial products whose value was going to collapse with the crisis. While everyone laughed at him at the time, he ended up making tens of billions of dollars from the crisis. As a result, this movie explains the 2008 crisis with a financial overview and shows you, among other things, why the crisis happened and how it could have been avoided. 

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3) Boiler Room (2000)

This film by Ben Younger tells the story of the Stratton Oakmont business, a brokerage firm founded by Jordan Belfort, the main protagonist of The Wolf of Wall Street. The main character is an ambitious young man who joins an illegal brokerage firm whose job is to sell fictitious stocks over the phone. The brokers mostly get exorbitant commissions. This story is the origin of one of the most devastating fraud practices. It shows the questionable practices of the distance selling industry and the consequences for both the buyers of these products and the brokers. 

4) Enron: The Smartest Guys in the room (2005)  

This film by Alex Gibney tells the true story of the collapse of Enron. Based on the book by the journalist who helped uncover the fraud, the film presents one of the biggest business scandals in American history. In 2001, Enron, a gas producer and distributor, was exposed for financial manipulation. The main reason for this is the scandal that affected its auditor, Andersen. Indeed, the latter is at the origin of Andersen's downfall and the end of the "Big Five", and notably participated in EY's takeover of the auditing world. This film shows the questionable practices of the company that led to its bankruptcy. 

5) Too Big to Fail: Wall Street Debacle (2011) 

This TV movie is adapted from the book of the same name by Andrew Ross Sorkin. Broadcast in 2011, it revisits the 2008 crisis by focusing on Henry Paulson, George W. Bush's Treasury Secretary, and Ben Bernanke, Fed Chairman. These two men are responsible for limiting the damage of this global crisis by managing some 700 billion dollars. Far from the usual point of view of traders or families affected by the crisis, Too Big to Fail focuses on this crisis from the point of view of the U.S. government officials. 

6) Margin Call (2011)   

This last film also traces the 2008 crisis over a period of 36 hours at the very beginning of the stock market crash. It traces the daily life of investment bankers who discovered the toxicity of their assets. Regardless of their ethics, they took all possible decisions to get rid of their assets without worrying about the consequences for their clients. With only one goal in mind: to save their company, this movie tells the story of the difficult decisions that the employees of this American investment bank had to make. 

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