The Wizard of Lies (2017)

Such a frustrating disappointment

It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

Best movie ever!

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

I was somewhat surprised by this biopic, since I'm well-acquainted with the modern Ponzi scheme story and $65 Billion ripoff committed by private investment firm. But even for those familiar with the general story, the documentary provides a fascinating portrait of the Madoff family and the central characters. Overall it reminds me of an epic Greek tragedy.The principal crime committed by Bernie Madoff is clearcut. In essence Madoff run a hedge fund that were one big hoax based on a pyramid investment scheme. All ROIs were fictitious and existing investors were paid by the money provided by subsequent investors. Aside from defrauding rich individuals of European royalty, Madoff took advantage of the fact that he as a jewish investor had excellent contacts to other wealthy American jews, which allowed him to swindle countless of the latter of all their retirement savings. All in all, in the end it led to countless tragedies and suicides on both continents.The financial thriller behind it has been well-told by previous accounts, particularly 'No One Would Listen' by Harry Markopolos (i.e. the financial analyst struggled to expose the fraud for many years). It's also true that the ramifications would have been much more limited if the SEC would have done their job properly.However, what this biopic does is following Bernie Madoff and the effects of the exposure on his own family, i.e. particularly his wife Ruth and his two adult sons. It seems as his family was completely unaware of the fraud and the movie does a good job in explaining how his sons never got the information from their dominating father. Later, when it all blew up the fraud also wreaked havoc on the lives of his wife and sons.In the end, it was all for nothing. The family members would lived longer and happier lives without massive fraud committed by the Bernard. While the portrait of him is by no means completely unsympathetic, he remains seemingly oblivious even to this day to the devastation he caused in so many lives, including to those nearest to him.The main roles played by Robert de Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer are brilliant, but also the less-known actors playing his two sons.

I won't talk about life lessons. Money is a risky thing. Big money, earned by putting in a (smaller) big money by making it rotate for your benefit - it's a visible clear risk. Like betting or gambling. So, if there are folks to "put in", there's always a nice guy to "take". Ponzi, of pyramid, or whatever one would call it, is a civilization lifelong issue. You want to believe, go on. OK, enough with moralizing. Acting is very good, oh, it's very-very good. Yes, am an admirer of RDN since God knows when, but the rest of the cast is a cast iron in themselves. Despite goofs etc, it's a tasty thing to watch. Like other tasty things, none of which last forever. Highly enjoyed it. Life's life. P.S.: then, why 8 out of 10?.. to take 2 out for moralizing; in the end, it's a real cost of (any) moralizing. Non, je ne regrette rien.

10/23/17. A decent TV movie about the Madoff debacle. This is the side that the public did not know that much about - what happened to the family. De Niro does a fine job as Madoff, a man swallowed by Greed, and Pfeiffer as his long suffering wife, who lost it all as well. Perhaps, a good lesson from all this is - Greed is never good, and that the piper will always get paid in the end.

A maze of personalities, character conflicts, financial downfall and modern-day Shakespearian betrayal permeates the Bernard Madoff story, masterfully adapted from Diana B. Henriques' book for HBO by Sam Levinson, Sam Baum and John Burnham Schwartz. Robert De Niro portrays American stockbroker Madoff, an investment adviser and financier who, after coming to the realization in the fall of 2008 that keeping up the façade to preserve his empire was too much to bear, confessed he was the operator of a Ponzi scheme, defrauding his wealthy clients out of some $65 billion, the largest financial fraud in U.S. history. A byzantine collection of family members, angry investors, employees and unwitting accomplices join the puzzled FBI and the disgusted media in taking Madoff to task for his actions--actions for which Madoff has no excuse. "I never thought of what I was doing as stealing," he says, adding, "My biggest weakness is I always wanted to please people...that's one that can get you into trouble." Thoroughly engrossing depiction of recent history, full of ferociously frank, barbed dialogue and terrific performances from the ensemble cast. Barry Levinson helmed the smooth direction, aided by Ron Patane's efficient past-and-present editing.