This is an absolutely fascinating story, mainly because it proves that truth is stranger than fiction. How on earth can a single man hold so much sway over people with his personality, that he can avert their attention so they don't notice the biggest swindle in Wall Street history happening? Because that's what it was -- Bernie Madoff using the force of his personality to continue to cajole and convince the SEC and other investigators to look the other way even in the face of overwhelming evidence of fraud.
Of course, this is also a damning proof that you can't trust the regulatory agencies (any of them -- not just the financial regulators) because they are made up of highly fallible people. I suppose the reason humanity has to keep learning this lesson the hard way is that we are ALL highly fallible people, so we don't seem to pick up on it when others are, too.
The docuseries itself is good, but not great. I give it a solid 5 stars, mostly for all of the interviews with former (innocent) employees, other key figures (like Harry Markopolos, the key whistleblower who was not listened to for years), some of the victims, and Madoff himself -- and the way the story is told clearly so that you really understand what went on. I had not understood exactly how Madoff's Ponzi scheme was constructed, or how it became so deeply entrenched in the financial community without being noticed as a scam, before watching this series.
I take a solid 5 stars off, though, because it would have been SO much better as a straight-up documentary. I would have loved to see more actual live footage and interviews or clips of actual REAL people talking about the story as it rolled out over the years.
What is the purpose of having actors who only look *faintly* like the real-life people they're supposed to portray, and who don't even do any actual acting? It's distracting and makes the entire thing take a lot longer to tell than it should. This could have been a gripping 2-hour documentary, and the fact that it was stretched out over more than 4 hours of psuedo-drama didn't do it any favors or make the story more interesting. Real life stories that are this compelling don't need dramatic reenacting to be interesting. They ARE the drama.
At most, if the director was insistent on using these "acting" montages, they should have been much shorter, less intrusive to the story itself, and much less indulgent in slo-mo (the slo-mo cutaway to "Madoff" walking through the office while employees shower him with dollar bills, which got repeated more than once, is an example of an annoyingly overused scene).
The few times they also tried that "actor moves from scene to set" thing (the same thing Hagai Levi did to absolute BRILLIANT effect in Scenes from a Marriage) not only fell flat, but were also so distracting that I had to stop and rewind so I could hear what was being said, since my mind immediately became focused on looking at the film crew.
The reasons it worked so well in Scenes from a Marriage were 1) it was first used BEFORE the scene began, so you weren't already involved in the scene and thus distracted by the effect of seeing the camera crew and set and 2) Jessica Chastain and Oscar Isaac are talented and well-known enough actors to be interesting to watch outside of their characters. In this docuseries, we don't really care about the guy who got dressed up as Madoff and never delivered a line (sorry, guy who played Madoff, but that's the way it goes).
Anyway, I definitely think the series is worth watching to learn more about the Madoff scandal, but you might find yourself less riveted than with other (much better done) series that are of a similar length.
Of course, this is also a damning proof that you can't trust the regulatory agencies (any of them -- not just the financial regulators) because they are made up of highly fallible people. I suppose the reason humanity has to keep learning this lesson the hard way is that we are ALL highly fallible people, so we don't seem to pick up on it when others are, too.
The docuseries itself is good, but not great. I give it a solid 5 stars, mostly for all of the interviews with former (innocent) employees, other key figures (like Harry Markopolos, the key whistleblower who was not listened to for years), some of the victims, and Madoff himself -- and the way the story is told clearly so that you really understand what went on. I had not understood exactly how Madoff's Ponzi scheme was constructed, or how it became so deeply entrenched in the financial community without being noticed as a scam, before watching this series.
I take a solid 5 stars off, though, because it would have been SO much better as a straight-up documentary. I would have loved to see more actual live footage and interviews or clips of actual REAL people talking about the story as it rolled out over the years.
What is the purpose of having actors who only look *faintly* like the real-life people they're supposed to portray, and who don't even do any actual acting? It's distracting and makes the entire thing take a lot longer to tell than it should. This could have been a gripping 2-hour documentary, and the fact that it was stretched out over more than 4 hours of psuedo-drama didn't do it any favors or make the story more interesting. Real life stories that are this compelling don't need dramatic reenacting to be interesting. They ARE the drama.
At most, if the director was insistent on using these "acting" montages, they should have been much shorter, less intrusive to the story itself, and much less indulgent in slo-mo (the slo-mo cutaway to "Madoff" walking through the office while employees shower him with dollar bills, which got repeated more than once, is an example of an annoyingly overused scene).
The few times they also tried that "actor moves from scene to set" thing (the same thing Hagai Levi did to absolute BRILLIANT effect in Scenes from a Marriage) not only fell flat, but were also so distracting that I had to stop and rewind so I could hear what was being said, since my mind immediately became focused on looking at the film crew.
The reasons it worked so well in Scenes from a Marriage were 1) it was first used BEFORE the scene began, so you weren't already involved in the scene and thus distracted by the effect of seeing the camera crew and set and 2) Jessica Chastain and Oscar Isaac are talented and well-known enough actors to be interesting to watch outside of their characters. In this docuseries, we don't really care about the guy who got dressed up as Madoff and never delivered a line (sorry, guy who played Madoff, but that's the way it goes).
Anyway, I definitely think the series is worth watching to learn more about the Madoff scandal, but you might find yourself less riveted than with other (much better done) series that are of a similar length.