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Carissa Green Reads

I read widely from many genres. Perhaps this blog will feature fewer ratings and reviews, but I certainly intend to write about my reading life - it's the subject I most find myself wanting to talk about.

Currently reading

D-Day: June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of WWII
Stephen E. Ambrose
Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad
M.T. Anderson
The Path Between the Seas
David McCullough
Chekhov Four Plays
Anton Chekhov, David Magarshack
The Gay Science: with a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs
Walter Kaufmann, Friedrich Nietzsche
A Kierkegaard Anthology
Robert W. Bretall

Notes on Adaptation: The Big Short

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine - Michael Lewis

I didn't love the film "The Big Short" as much as some people did, but I did like it. I could have done without the montages of stock footage and close-ups of "strippers." 

 

But we have to talk about Michael Lewis. He is so gifted at taking subjects that can be difficult to understand - finance, statistics - and making them accessible to a lay reader. Even if you don't care to see "The Big Short," read the book - it's entertaining, and you'll "get it."

 

Here's the thing that happens in the adaptation: Lewis's explanations are taken over by semi-famous people doing unusual stuff - Margot Robbie in a bathtub; Anthony Bourdain making fish stew, etc. It's clever. In its way. Good times. Good times. 

 

The other notable thing about this film as an adaptation is that the names of all of the persons in Lewis' book have been changed, except for Michael Burry (Christian Bale's character). 

 

-cg