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I thought this was one of Soderbergh's better films. The mechanics of high finance might be the focus of the movie but the script opts to skim the surface of financial minutiae which allows it to breezily unfold without becoming heavy handed or inscrutable. The middle "African" section is about as entertaining as anything Soderbergh's ever done and would make a fine stand alone short. I also liked Schwimmer a lot but Sharon Stone stole the one scene she was in. On the negative side Streep seems determined to drag us along with her while she continues to probe the outer limits of self upstagemanship. Has she become so bored with straight dramatic roles that a part's only attractive if it's a singing, dancing, five hours in the makeup chair, two hours with the dialect coach, celebrity mimicking, scenery chewing extravaganza? A nice counterpoint is Gary Oldman, who knows a thing or two about going over the top and who here plays the entire movie with a ridiculous German accent yet somehow never crosses the line into pointless show offery. He's onscreen roughly the same amount of time as Streep but he's enjoying himself, not straining to keep himself entertained.

I think Brian C is right on the money-Soderbergh has no dog in this fight. He doesn't seem all that interested in making some comment on the evils of capitalism or corporate greed. That's pretty well trod territory at this point anyway and it allows Soderbergh to come across more as a casual observer than a hard liner. Which is to say he feels similarly about finance as he felt about environmentalism in Erin Brockovich-he's interested in the personalities and machinations and the personal end effect, not the "how or "why" or "how could they?". Why feign outrage when you're just not? I liked it a lot.

I think the movie’s very good and definitely the better of Soderbergh’s two this year; I think it’s basically a riff on L’argent done in the mold of La ronde, a journey presented by two empresarios following money round and round as it manages to just about destroy everything it touches. The thing that I really liked is how playful it was with its episodic structure: despite being ostensibly divided by the film’s cards, many of the film’s episodes like Schwimmer’s aren’t just one and done and are given in fragments, leaving us unsure if they’re to return or if their sad story will really be left where it’s at.

I also LOVE the look of this movie, which is the total opposite end of the High Flying Bird thing. Because he can get the money for it the movie’s being shot with more sharpness than anything I’ve seen, which is so refreshing as I was resigned to him sticking to the mobile cameras he’d switched to.