Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
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DVD Cover Information
Brand: Magnolia PicturesDVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo; Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Format: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.78:1
Running Time: 110 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-01-17
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Model: 10001
Studio: Magnolia
Product features:
- Based on the best-selling book of the same name by Fortune reporters Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind, a multidimensional study of one of the biggest business scandals in American history. The chronicle takes a look at one of the greatest corporate disasters in history, in which top executives from the 7th largest company in this country walked away with over one billion dollars, leaving investors
Movie Reviews of Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
Movie Review: The Ugly Face of Greed...
Summary: 5 Stars
At first, I wasn't too keen on seeing this movie- Its title, ENRON-THE SMARTEST GUYS IN THE ROOM- suggested to me that it would be about a bunch of smart guys number crunching on their way to faking accounting records. What else would a bunch of 'smart guys' do?
Well, certainly the Enron executives did this. The film explains in easy to understand terms how Chief Operating Officer Jeff Skilling demanded the use of 'Mark to Marketing' - an accounting scheme allowing him to post 'future profits' of an new idea immediately (ie, if an idea of inventing a new spaceship design is expected to reap a billion dollars in the future, one could post the profits now, never mind that the ship may never get built, if built may not work as envisioned, or people may loose interest in space, and so on.) Of course, such profits were not 'real' but nicely balanced off Enron's actual massive losses. Also balancing off Enron's massive losses were the fake companies created by Andy Fastow, which he used to bury Enron's enormous debts- and in the meantime, pocketed millions for himself.
But while shady accounting schemes may explain the technical, proximate causes of the fall of Enron, it is not the ultimate explanation. The ultimate reason why Enron fell is pure, naked, ugly- and all to human- Greed. And this is what the film portrays, and does so brilliantly, with insider footage showing 'Enron skits' and meetings, and recordings of conversations and deals being made in the trading floor.
We get to see Jeff Skilling in a skit in which he snickers and mocks his own accounting strategy, stating "...we can add a kazillion dollars to the bottom line." We see Andy Fastow in an insider video, with a sly grin on his face, explaining to greedy bankers (all the big guns like Citibank, Deutsche Bank, etc) his scheme to be the CFO of both his shell company LJM and Enron. Never mind any conflict of interest, as he will always be on 'LJM's side of the transaction" (netting both him and the greedy bankers money at the expense of Enron).
Even worse was the greedy, cut throat culture that developed among Enron traders. My jaw dropped as I heard one trader coolly telling a California energy power station to 'power down' for a bit, by 'making up' an excuse, so they could artificially limit California's energy supply to make obscene profits. Even worse were traders laughing hysterically and cheering as energy power lines burned in California, chanting "Burn Baby Burn!!" And why not? Supposedly a young trader could make enough in one afternoon to buy a Mercedes Benz, flat out!
Other facets of the ugly face of Enron included the bizarre 'extreme sport' trips taken by Enron Execs (bunch of guys riding motor cycles in the dirt) and the practice of taking clients out to strip clubs and charging it to the corporate account (exemplified by Lou Pai, but was popular among the rest as well- when this was eventually cancelled at the severe protest of some female employees, apparently a pall of silence fell over the trading floor for 3 days!). There is also Enron's arrogance that it could 'trade' everything, including the weather!
Jeff Skilling comes off as particularly arrogant- he states he wanted to help FORTUNE reporter Bethany Mclean "understand what she is asking" when she wanted to know why Enron's numbers didn't add up. When despite his bullying, she decided to publish her findings (or lack of) anyway, he amazingly calls her decision 'unethical.' Well, clearly, Mclean did know what she was asking- "IS ENRON OVERPRICED" was the first article suggesting something maybe wrong with Enron. Later, he calls someone else who questioned the validity of Enron's accounting an "a-- h---."
Compared to Skilling and the others, Ken Lay comes off as rather clueless, but just as greedy. It is almost as if he didn't really care what went on in his company, as long as it made money. We see him on 9-11-2001 comparing Enron's troubles to 9-11, but stating with confidence that things will bounce back. Later, when Enron is in a free fall, he makes bizarre claims to his worried employees that the company is strong, and will regain healthy stock figures, causing one of his employees to ask him "are you are on crack." Indeed.
The film also highlights the fact that guilt for the Enron debacle falls far beyond Enron itself. Greedy corporate banks actively participated in illegal money-making deals with Fastow, as mentioned above. Accounting firm Arthur Anderson happily cooked Enron's books with Mark-to-Marketing accounting and other accounding frauds, and then shredded millions of documents when investigations began. Stock analysts happily took Jeff Skilling's word that Enron's stock was doing great- and issued 'strong buy' or 'buy' ratings, without actually analyzing the stock. Lawyers signed off on everything. And the rest of us, dazzled by the stock market boom and greedy at the thought of making big bucks, kept buying Enron stock. No one ever "asked why" Enron was such a shining star- and whether it really deserved to be.
The insider material on Enron (the recordings, the videos) alone would have made a fascinating, shocking tale. But the movie adds incisive, fast paced interviews with both insiders and critics of Enron, as well as catchy, and very appropriate theme tunes. (`Dear Mr. Fantasy' for Andy Fastow is particularly appropriate- as it sounds like `Dear Mr. Fastow!')
As Amazon suggests, watch this move with THE CORPORATION. THE CORPORATION provides the theoretical background as to the psychopathic nature of all corporations, while this movie provides the perfect, feature length case-study.
Summary of Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
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