Director: Nicholas Jarecki
Cast: Richard Gere, Susan Sarandon, Tim Roth, Brit
Marling, Laetitia Casta, Nate Parker
Rating: (M)
4 stars (out of 5)
Casting aside a run of successful rom-coms in the 1980s,
liaisons with supermodels and an urban myth that is probably
best forgotten, Richard Gere's acting has never really been in
question. It's more his choice of roles.
So following on from his inspired performance in Todd Hayne's
I'm Not There, Gere gets another chance to impress as
a wealthy silver fox with more than a few secrets to hide.
Gere plays Robert Miller, a seriously wealthy hedge-fund
manager in the twilight of his career, and the patriarch of a
family that is pitched as the backbone of his success. The
apple-pie perfection is simply too saccharine to be real and,
of course, it isn't.
On the verge of selling his trading firm for a bomb, Miller
is sweating over a failed investment, his fraudulent
cover-up, and his burgeoning affair with a significantly
younger art dealer. When events take the expected turn for
the worse, a cat and mouse game of deceit and counterdeceit
is brilliantly orchestrated by a cast that includes the
consistently impressive Susan Sarandon and Tim Roth, who is
brilliant as the thorn in Miller's side.
Ramping up the intensity via additional threads involving an
acquaintance from Miller's past, and the harrowing reality of
lessons learnt from the credit crunch, Arbitrage is as
taut a thriller as you are likely to see in 2012.
Best thing: Richard Gere's perfectly measured
performance.
Worst thing: The distasteful spectre of odious people
with too much money wilfully ruining other people's
lives.
See it with: The knowledge that arbitrage is the
practice of taking advantage of a price difference between
markets.
- Mark Orton
A name, residential address, and (preferably residential) telephone number is required from readers who comment on ODT Online. These details will not be visible to site visitors.