Here's a movie that has better intentions than it does execution. It's obviously supposed to be a conversation piece for big money's interest in the economy, but it comes off as more a movie about a lone, desperate man willing to sacrifice his life to make a point (we do end up feeling sorry for this character thanks to a decent screenplay and good performances by the three leads—George Clooney, Julia Roberts, and Jack O'Connell).
Money Monster is not about the 2008 Great Recession, despite the language being used that resembles so much of what we're hearing today on the campaign trail, instead the setup is there's a big company whose stock is ripe for purchasing because it's always a great investment, so says George Clooney on his television show Money Monster, but then this single companies stock plummets because of "a computer glitch" (which I never could buy that anyone believed that that explanation would work in real life with stock holders. I mean, I guess crazier things have happened, but more people than just this one blue collar worker would be royally pissed if this were the explanation), and costing stockholders millions of dollars. The lone desperate man is one of these investors, he lost 10,000 dollars after listening to Clooney's advice and sticking all of his inheritance in it.
So, that's the setup. The rest of the movie is relatively tense, there's character evolution in Clooney's character, and the plot moves forward at a good pace, ending in a satisfying enough finally. Over all, it's a decent film, one worth checking out if it happens to be playing on a screen nearby, but nothing to seek out.