Too Big to Fail (film)

*Too Big to Fail*
Too Big to Fail
Based on	Too Big to Fail; by Andrew Ross Sorkin
Written by	Peter Gould
Directed by	Curtis Hanson
Starring	William Hurt; Edward Asner; Billy Crudup; Paul Giamatti; Topher Grace; Cynthia Nixon; Bill Pullman; Tony Shalhoub; James Woods
Theme music composer	Marcelo Zarvos
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
Production
Producer	Ezra Swerdlow
Cinematography	Kramer Morgenthau
Editors	,
Running time	98 minutes
Production companies	; HBO Films
Release
Original network	HBO
Original release	May 23, 2011;

Too Big to Fail is an American biographical drama television film first broadcast on HBO on May 23, 2011 based on Andrew Ross Sorkin's non-fiction book Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System—and Themselves (2009). The film was directed by Curtis Hanson. It received 11 nominations at the 63rd Primetime Emmy Awards; Paul Giamatti's portrayal of Ben Bernanke earned him the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Miniseries or Television Movie at the 18th Screen Actors Guild Awards.

Plot summary[]

Too Big to Fail chronicles the 2008 financial meltdown, focusing on the actions of U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson (William Hurt) and Ben Bernanke (Paul Giamatti), Chairman of the Federal Reserve System, to contain the problems during the period of August 2008 to October 13, 2008. The film starts with clips of news reports about the mortgage industry crisis and the forced sale of the troubled Bear Stearns to JPMorgan Chase, with Fed guarantees.

With Bear Stearns out of the picture, short sellers have turned their attention on Lehman Brothers. In need of capital, CEO Dick Fuld (James Woods) reluctantly fires COO Joe Gregory and CFO Erin Callan, naming Bart McDade as the new president and COO. McDade begins to successfully negotiate a deal with Korean investors, hinging on the condition that Lehman's toxic real estate is excluded. The deal fall's through however when Fuld's pride gets the best of him and he tries to coerce the Koreans into accepting the real estate assets.

Paulson is adamant that the government will not subsidize any more acquisitions, but it becomes clear the most promising buyer for Lehman, Bank of America, is uninterested without Fed involvement. Paulson and President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York Timothy Geithner (Billy Crudup) gather the leaders of the biggest banks, including Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein (Evan Handler), JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon (Bill Pullman), and Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack (Tony Shalhoub), to convince them to underwrite the deal themselves. During a break in negotiations, another threatened firm, Merrill Lynch, approaches Bank of America to buy them instead, which Paulson tacitly okays. With Bank of America purchasing Merrill Lynch, the only other buyer is British firm Barclays, but their involvement is blocked by British banking regulators. Lehman collapses and is forced into bankruptcy. Meanwhile, insurance firm AIG also begins to fail.

Lehman's collapse affects the entire financial market, and the stock market goes into freefall. Blankfein, Mack, and General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt inform Paulson they are unable to do business, and French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde warns him that he must not allow AIG to fail, as the crisis is affecting Europe as well. Unlike Lehman, the Treasury rescues AIG with an $85 billion loan.

Bernanke argues that the Congress must pass legislation to authorize any continued intervention by the Fed or the Treasury. With the availability of credit drying up, Paulson's plan is to buy the toxic assets from the banks to take the risk off their books and increase their cash reserves. Bernanke and Paulson lobby Congress, with Bernanke emphasizing the potential of fallout worse than the Great Depression if they fail to act. Paulson threatens U.S. Senator and Presidential candidate John McCain not to interfere and begs Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi not to back away from the negotiations. After a wave of panic and personal haranguing from President George W. Bush, the legislation passes on a second attempt and the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) is created.

Paulson's team realizes that buying toxic assets will take too long, leaving direct capital injects into the banks as their only option to use TARP to get credit flowing again. Along with FDIC Chair Sheila Bair, Paulson informs the banks that they will receive mandatory capital injections. The banks eventually agree, but Paulson's staff laments that the parties who caused the crisis are being allowed to dictate the terms of how they should use the billions with which they are being bailed out. An epilogue notes that bank mergers continued in the wake of the crisis, and that now only ten financial institutions hold 77% of all U.S. banking assets and have been declared too big to fail.

Cast[]

The cast includes the following:^[1]

William Hurt as Henry Paulson (U.S. Treasury Secretary and former Chairman and CEO, Goldman Sachs)
Edward Asner as Warren Buffett (Primary shareholder, Chairman and CEO, Berkshire Hathaway)
Billy Crudup as Timothy Geithner (President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York)
Paul Giamatti as Ben Bernanke (Chairman of the Federal Reserve)
Topher Grace as Jim Wilkinson (Chief of Staff, U.S. Treasury Department)
Matthew Modine as John Thain (Chairman and CEO, Merrill Lynch)
Cynthia Nixon as Michele Davis (Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Public Relations and Director of Policy Planning)
Michael O'Keefe as Chris Flowers (Chairman and CEO, J.C. Flowers & Co.)
Bill Pullman as Jamie Dimon (Chairman and CEO, JPMorgan Chase)
Tony Shalhoub as John Mack (Chairman and CEO, Morgan Stanley)
James Woods as Dick Fuld (Chairman and CEO, Lehman Brothers)
Ayad Akhtar as Neel Kashkari (Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for International Economics and Development)

Kathy Baker as Wendy Paulson (Wife of Henry Paulson)
Amy Carlson as Erin Callan (CFO, Lehman Brothers)
Evan Handler as Lloyd Blankfein (Chairman and CEO, Goldman Sachs)
John Heard as Joe Gregory (President and COO, Lehman Brothers)
Dan Hedaya as Rep. Barney Frank (Chairman of the U.S. House Financial Services Committee (D-MA))
Peter Hermann as Christopher Cox (Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission)
Chance Kelly as Bart McDade (President and COO, Lehman Brothers)
Tom Mason as Bob Willumstad (Chairman and CEO, AIG)
Ajay Mehta as Vikram Pandit (CEO, Citigroup)
as Jeffrey Immelt (CEO, General Electric)
Laila Robins as Christine Lagarde (French Finance Minister)
Victor Slezak as Greg Curl (Director of Planning, Bank of America)
Joey Slotnick as Dan Jester (Retired Goldman Sachs banker and newly appointed Paulson Advisor)
Casey Biggs as Richard Kovacevich (Chairman, Wells Fargo & Company)
Steve Tom as Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT)
Bud Jones as Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV)
Jonathan Freeman as Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL)
as Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi (Speaker of the House of Representatives (D-CA))
as Sheila Bair (Chairman, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation)

Home media[]

The DVD was released on June 12, 2012.^[2]

Reception[]

Critical reception[]

On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 74%, based on 27 reviews, and an average rating of 6/10.^[3] On Metacritic, the movie received a weighted average score of 67/100 from 17 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".^[4]

The A.V. Club gave the film a B rating.^[5]

Awards[]

2011 Emmy Awards

Nominated: Outstanding Miniseries or Movie
Nominated: Outstanding Directing for a Miniseries, Movie, or Dramatic Special (Curtis Hanson)
Nominated: Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Miniseries or Movie
Nominated: Outstanding Casting for a Miniseries, Movie, or Special
Nominated: Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or Movie (William Hurt)
Nominated: Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or Movie (Paul Giamatti & James Woods)
Nominated: Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries, Movie, or Dramatic Special (Peter Gould)
Nominated: Outstanding Cinematography for a Miniseries or Movie
Nominated: Outstanding Main Title Design
Nominated: Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Miniseries or a Movie

2012 Golden Globe Awards

Nominated: Best Miniseries or Television Film
Nominated: Best Actor in a Miniseries or Television Film - (William Hurt)
Nominated: Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Miniseries or Television Film - (Paul Giamatti)

2012 Screen Actors Guild Awards

Won: Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Miniseries or Television Movie - (Paul Giamatti)
Nominated: Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Miniseries or Television Movie - (James Woods)

2012 Writers Guild of America Awards

Won: Writers Guild Award for Long Form Adaptation - (Peter Gould)

References[]

^ "Too Big to Fail: Cast & Crew". HBO Movies. HBO. Retrieved January 31, 2012.
^ "Too Big to Fail". Complete Season DVDs. Archived from the original on March 5, 2016. Retrieved June 28, 2012.
^ "Too Big to Fail (2011)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. Retrieved June 25, 2018.
^ "Too Big To Fail Reviews". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. June 25, 2018.
^ Tobias, Scott (May 23, 2011). "Too Big To Fail". The A.V. Club. The Onion. Retrieved June 25, 2018.

External links[]

[1] "Too Big to Fail: Cast & Crew". HBO Movies. HBO. Retrieved January 31, 2012.

[2] "Too Big to Fail". Complete Season DVDs. Archived from the original on March 5, 2016. Retrieved June 28, 2012.

[3] "Too Big to Fail (2011)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. Retrieved June 25, 2018.

[4] "Too Big To Fail Reviews". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. June 25, 2018.

[5] Tobias, Scott (May 23, 2011). "Too Big To Fail". The A.V. Club. The Onion. Retrieved June 25, 2018.

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v t Curtis Hanson
Films directed	Sweet Kill (1973) The Little Dragons (1979) Losin' It (1983) The Children of Times Square (1986, TV) The Bedroom Window (1987) Bad Influence (1990) The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1992) The River Wild (1994) L.A. Confidential (1997) Wonder Boys (2000) 8 Mile (2002) In Her Shoes (2005) Lucky You (2007) Too Big to Fail (2011, TV) Chasing Mavericks (2012)
Films written	The Dunwich Horror (1970) The Silent Partner (1978) White Dog (1982) Never Cry Wolf (1983)