The Big Short

There aren't many films about the 2008 crash and what caused it, apart from the odd documentary (notably Inside Job, a 2010 film by Charles Ferguson), but there have been many books and one, written by Michael Lewis, who wrote Moneyball and Liars Poker, has been turned into a movie starring Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt.

Analysing the existing mortgage bond market, eccentric hedge fund manager Michael Burry (Bale) decides to "short" i.e. bet against the market,  which he thinks will shortly collapse. He is followed by other hedge fund managers Mark Baum (Carell), Charlie Geller (John Magaro) and Jamie Shipley (Finn Wittrock).

It must have been very difficult to portray the intricacies of what happened to an audience munching on their popcorn, but the use of celebrity asides, although corny, does work quite well and the moral outrage is expressed by Baum on the one hand and Ben Rickert (Pitt) on the other rings true. That it was allowed to happen at all and that others didn't spot the problems sooner is the truly amazing part.

Despicable Me 2 - The Minions (and Gru) Return!

Taking advantage of Cheap Tuesday, I went to see the latest Despicable Me. Gru, having a difficult time adjusting to non-villainy, is recruited by the Anti-Villain League after a mutating serum is stolen by a mysterious super-villain.

Absolutely hillarious. Steve Carell is back as Gru, ably supported by Russell Brand, as Dr. Nefario, and Miranda Cosgrove, Dana Gaier, Elsie Fisher as his three wards, with Kristen Wiig as the new love interest (I can see women everywhere trying to buy a lipstick taser).

It's the minions who steal the show, however, as you'd expect, starting with a 21 fart gun salute and ending the film with funniest rendition of Y.M.C.A. I have ever heard. Go and see it: you won't regret it.

Despicable Me

If you want to watch a great family film over Christmas, you could do a lot worse than this:

Grue (kudos on the Zork reference), a super villain, has competition from Vector in his latest plan to steal the moon, and uses some little girls from a local orphanage to help him.

Surprisingly awtic (something that makes you go "awww"), the minions are a stroke of genius and I'm surprised they're not franchised already. I'd love one!

... and the joke about the Fart Gun, "I ordered a Dart Gun!"