Independent Lens {Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room}

One of the greatest scandals in American corporate history is chronicled in the riveting documentary Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room. Based on the bestselling book by Fortune magazine reporters Bethany McLean and Peter Elkin, and directed by Alex Gibney (who also produced The Trials of Henry Kissinger), the film is an epic morality tale, drawing upon a wealth of insider interviews and archival material to show how Enron, once the nation's seventh largest corporate entity, essentially faked its bookkeeping to report profits that never existed. The corrupt and closely-guarded mismanagement by Enron executives (including Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, later placed on criminal trial) is revealed through such heinous concepts as "Hypothetical Future Value" (a way of reaping fortunes based on false profit projections) and the use of offshore "shell" companies to hide the massive losses that eventually toppled the company (along with the venerable Arthur Anderson accounting firm) and left 20,000 employees jobless. As a maddening portrait of hubris and white-collar crime, Enron transcends political and corporate boundaries by showing how smart and powerful men grew blinded by greed and brought ruin upon themselves, along with thousands of otherwise innocent victims. For better and worse, it's a perfect double-feature with eye-opening 2004 documentary The Corporation. --Jeff Shannon Amazon.com

Lions for Lambs

"Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room" is a chilling,engrossing,and surprisingly timely documentary on how a corporation fleeced tons of hard-working Americans and made millions in the process. It starts with ordinary,talented men like the late Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling,as well as an Asian man fascinated by numbers and strippers. They started out as entrepreneurs; they weren't born with silver spoons. In retrospect,it's fascinating to see their ads depicting Enron as an innovative company bringing light to the world.

"Enron" shows the consequences of following Gordon Gecko's "Greed is good" motto. Lay, Skilling, and his associates began to consider themselves above the law. They created artificial shortages and rolling blackouts. In one chilling scene,employees laugh about leaving a grandmother in the dark while shaking her down for money. There was undisciplined speculation, business at its worst. While the movie plays up Enron's connections with the Bush family, Enron also had Democratic connections,and Democratic California governor Gray Davis let them get away with highway robbery.

When people talk about the hikes in oil prices as "Enronesque",this documentary shows why. Enron played the system... and it paid. What goes around comes around. June 26, 2008

Worthy of Euripides- A True American Tradgedy.

You all probably know the story: It briefly dominated the news the late 2001.

Enron, named one of "America's Most Innovative Companies" by Fortune magazine for six consecutive years, from 1996 to 2001. On the Fortune's "100 Best Companies to Work for in America" list in 2000. Reported 111 Billion in earnings that same year. Purportedly one of the ten most valuable American corporations, throughout the Nineties. Audited by Arther Andersen, the oldest and one of the most respected accounting firms in the country. Touted and endorsed by nearly all the biggest Wall Street brokers, backed by all the biggest international banks. Called the most important and cutting edge energy trading firm in the world. A halcyon of the new economy, champion of globalism, huge contributer to politicians both Democratic and Republican, but most especially the Bush family dynasty (largest single corporate contributor to George W. Bush's 2000 campaign)..

Just evaporated, imploded seamlessly in upon itself in late 2001.

Other events later in that year naturally distracted us all from what would have otherwise been the singular most important story of that year.. Much to the relief of many in Washington, and on Wall Street.

So it seems that the significance of what happened never really set into the public consciousness.

This film will recollect your mind, and help you understand. I say every American needs to meditate on this story, most especially as it now seems that it may not be the odd aberration that most of our political and financial elites then claimed.

I was living in Monterey, California during the time. During the oh so odd rolling blackouts that killed so many traffic lights, air conditioners, and life support apparatuses.. along with some of the poor people that depended on them.. It was the same summer it seemed that half the state was on fire. Warm Corona in the fridge, Apocalypse in the air..

Ah, Good Times..

This film unsparingly reveals who was really behind that catastrophe. Here - amongst many other astounding things - you'll hear tapes of the Enron energy traders (like their colleagues in other energy companies) as they deliberately manipulate the power grid, shutting down power plants at peak demand, thereby driving up electricity prices and blacking out large parts of the state, all the while watching the havoc they make.. and laughing about it. All as their company, along with the pensions funds of tens of thousands of ordinary employees, was collapsing around them.

Enron: True Champions of Deregulation. Pihranas in the kiddie pool. Nihilists, with with no thought of the people they were harming, their only thought on the billions they made off the public's soaring utility bills. All as they were going bankrupt. True black comedy.

The thing is that that this story, all the irresponsible greed and corruption, is supposed to have been localized. It was "only" Enron, World Com, and Tyco that were led by the bad apples. Remember President Bush assuring us? And Congress rushing to pass all those new, tough accounting laws?

Get this film, pop some corn, snuggle up on the couch, and push play.

Watch this, think about about it, and wonder. Do you believe them? Do you still trust them?

As a great American orator once put it "Fool me once, shame on -- shame on you. Fool me -- you can't get fooled again."

Yeah, right. Ain't that the truth.

April 24, 2008

Unfettered Hubris Drives Intriguing Account of Enron Scandal

Even after reading Kurt Eichenwald's Conspiracy of Fools: A True Story, I was not prepared for the near-Greek tragedy presented in this smartly produced documentary of the Enron scandal based on yet another book, Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron, by journalists Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind. Directed by Andy Gibney, the 2005 film follows the complicated rise and fall of Enron in an easy-to-follow, chronological order since the mid-1980's, using actor Peter Coyote's lucid voice-over narration. Enron started as a moderate-sized Houston gas-pipeline company that grew exponentially, reaping benefits for shareholders and far more so for the Enron executive team for a long, uninterrupted stretch. Billions of dollars were collected due to speculative mark-to-market accounting techniques approved by the SEC, and Enron consequently became one of the world's largest natural-gas suppliers.

What resonates most from this searing film is how circumstantially pathological the chief villains are in this true corporate morality story. While the infamous Ken Lay comes across as the corrupt figurehead we have already come to know through news reports, it's really Enron CFO Andy Fastow (dubbed appropriately "The Sorcerer's Apprentice") and especially President and COO Jeff Skilling, who are mercilessly exposed here. Skilling is portrayed as a brilliant leader and a corporate Darwinist, whose favorite book is Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene, which he apparently translated into a bloodless performance review policy that worked like a genetic algorithm for people. Employees were rated on a 1-5 scale based on the amount of money one made for the company. Skilling mandated that between 10-15% of employees had to be rated as 5's (worst). And to get a rating of 5 meant that one was immediately fired. This review process was dubbed "rank and yank". Such was a typical example of his survivalist thinking.

The corruption spread throughout the company, as Enron was responsible for, among other things, gaming the Northern California "rolling blackouts" in 2001, whereby the company profited as huge parts of the state were plunged into darkness. Citizens were threatened by a deregulation plan that essentially enabled a number of immoral Enron traders (led by Tim Belden) to place calls that drove up energy-market prices and took advantage of power-plant shutdowns. Of course, the Bush family dynasty does not come across unscathed in the Enron story and justifiably so according to their inextricable ties to Lay. Gibney effectively uses video footage from testimony at congressional hearings, as well as interviews with disillusioned former employees such as Mike Muckleroy and whistle-blower Sherron Watkins (who uses some effective pop culture references like Body Heat and Jonestown to get her points across).

There are some amusing vignettes and images that tie some of the disparate elements together with excessive glibness. The documentary is best when it sticks to the facts, for this is one inarguable case where fact is truly stranger than fiction. Extras are plentiful on the 2006 DVD. Gibney provides an informative albeit verbose commentary track, and four deleted scenes, about twenty minutes in total, are included that become redundant with the film's portrayal of corporate malfeasance. There is also a fourteen-minute making-of featurette, as well as a "Where Are They Now?" snippet on the principals and three separate conversations with McLean and Elkind on how they got the story, how they validated their findings, and their enthusiastic reaction to the film. Other bonus materials include Gibney reading from scripts of skits performed at Enron and a Firesign Theater sketch about Enron's demise, as well as Fortune Magazine articles written by McLean and Elkind and a gallery of editorial cartoons. April 9, 2008

Finally, a logical and watchable explanation

Director Alex Gibney has crafted a fine film, making crystal clear the arrogance, duplicity and horror of the Enron scandal. Previous reviewers have covered it all, but I must reiterate that the events are put in a perspective that any middle-schooler could understand. I was angry watching this film, so I guess it secceeded in its mission. The greed and intentional cruelty are well-examined, especially in the references to the traders' comments regarding the California energy crisis. Former Governer Gray Davis was painted as the bad guy, but he was duped, as many others, by the false promises of the Enron bigshots. I have empathy for him and the misunderstanding. Evil takes many forms; the public at large will believe a lot if the lie sounds good enough. Thousands of people were destroyed by Enron, and the punishment of those responsible cannot, ever, be put in terms that anyone could understand. Lives were crushed and destroyed, and because of their association with Bush & Cheney, there's a chance they'll be around again. This kind of thing goes a lot deeper than anyone is aware. Films like this may curb that trend. April 7, 2008

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room

Chilling.
Raises very troubling questions. How can a handful of greedy, ruthless but politically well connected people get away with this in America?
Those who believe it points to a loss of our national moral compass may find their suspicions confirmed. March 6, 2008

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