Visible Hands: Charles Fergusons ‘Inside Job’

Inside Job,” the film by Charles Ferguson, about the economic meltdown of 2008, richly deserves an Oscar nomination, if not a win, for Best Documentary. What the film deserves most, however, is to be seen. The main point of the film—that the Great Recession was avoidable—should be seared onto the consciousness of the American public. Especially since so many contrary voices have tried to excuse the pain as an aberration, an unpredictable “perfect storm.” This timely documentary establishes that leaders who might have taken steps to mitigate or avoid the disaster refused to listen to the few experts who pointed out problems well in advance.

One prophetic voice, that of Brooksley Born, was summarily denounced. Recently dubbed “the Credit Crisis Cassandra” by the Washington Post, Born was head of the Commodities Futures Trading Commission from 1996 to 1999, when she warned that credit default swaps could lead to economic calamity. She wanted to regulate derivatives. How did her peers respond? According to the Wall Street Journal, the top financial regulators wished Born “would just shut up.” That’s just one example.

The work of Charles Ferguson, who wrote, directed and produced this outstanding film (narrated by Matt Damon), has been recognized by the Academy before. “No End in Sight,” his documentary about the lead up to the Iraq War, was nominated for an Oscar in 2008.

In comparison with, for example, Michael Moore’s contrarian documentaries, “Inside Job” is faster paced and more straightforward; that is, it relies less on games of entrapment. Still, Ferguson delivers, in close-ups, unforgettable shots of men who indict themselves by their own evasions, refusals and denials. Some interviewees exhibit unrepentant pomposity when an honest answer to Ferguson (who is always an unseen questioner, unlike the center-stage Moore), might have saved their credibility.

Viewers will see, among others: Frederic Mishkin, a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, who is asked why he resigned from the board a month before the crash; Richard Fuld, former C.E.O. of Lehman Brothers; Lloyd Blankfein, chief executive of Goldman Sachs; Frank Raines, former C.E.O. of Fannie Mae; Robert Rubin, whose resumé includes a stint as a board member of Goldman Sachs, the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury under President Clinton and a director of Citigroup; and Glenn Hubbard, who was President Bush’s chief economic advisor, and is currently dean of the Columbia School of Business. Hubbard becomes indignant, then curt, during the questioning, ready to eject the interviewer from the room.

What becomes overwhelmingly clear in the film is that government (both the Bush and Obama administrations) has deep ties to the very people who occupied positions of power in the businesses at the center of the crisis. Some have made enormous sums playing both sides of the meltdown.

Henry Paulson is a prime example. Paulson led Goldman Sachs before President Bush appointed him Secretary of the Treasury. At that point Paulson was allowed to sell hundreds of millions of dollars worth of his Goldman stock tax-free, and he later funneled billions to Goldman during the bailout. None of this is, technically, illegal. But it is mercenary in the extreme and grossly unfair, given that millions of Americans have lost their jobs and their homes as a result of the misdeeds of Wall Street, unscrupulous bankers and their peers in the real estate industry.

The roles of Timothy Geithner and Lawrence Summers, before and after the fall of Lehman, are also held up for inspection. Those cast in the roles of sage or analyst include (America contributor) Charles Morris, George Soros, Elliot Spitzer (no kidding!) and Christine Lagarde, the French finance minister, who adds a touch of class as well as internationalism to the mix.

“Inside Job” moves so briskly that some viewers, unfamiliar with the world of finance, may have difficulty taking it all in during a single viewing. The antidote may be to see it more than once, or wait for the DVD. But the film is not simply educational but entertaining, a suspenseful story with a beginning, middle and an end; it uses interesting camera work throughout and sometimes stunning visuals. Not a frame is amateurish.

Overall, the documentary’s effect goes far beyond the genre’s basic purpose, which is to nail things onto the public record, especially things that have eluded it thus far, and to put that record before the public. If not completely convincing on every point, the film makes a coherent argument that one must labor to dispute or refute.

Some of the documentary’s drawbacks cannot be helped: since most viewers are not in a position to influence national monetary policy, for example, such a film can lead one to feel helpless, even cynical not only about corporate greed but about the potential of government to successfully regulate business and avoid a future financial meltdown. Finally, the film does little to inspire hope. That may have to do with the fact that, although the recession has been declared over, the effects are still debilitating and seem to be worsening, as we are seeing in Europe as well as the United States.

Anyone who wishes to understand more about what caused the current economic crisis would do well to see “Inside Job.” The film, along with a spate of reflective books and articles, could help to inform and rouse the public. Too often those who are informed are not roused; those who are roused are not informed. We need to be both.

This article appears in January 3 2011.