Busfilm: Forbes survey

Forbes’ story on “The Ten Greatest Business Movies” and related stories on Forbes.com, says a lot about films’ attitude toward business. The top ten were: Citizen Kane, The Godfather: Part II, It's a WonderfulLife, The Godfather, Network, The Insider, Glengarry Glen Ross, Wall Street, Tin Men, Modern Times. I discuss these films in the latest version of my article.

This film list provides new fodder for my theory. My thesis, again, is that, while films usually portray business in a bad light, they do not really say that business is bad. After all, the films most of us see are produced by big businesses.

More precisely, films are made by people working in these businesses. Filmmakers see themselves as artists, the latest in a long line from cave painters through Michelangelo. Yet, unlike many artists, filmmakers’ art is so costly that films cannot get made without lots of money. Filmmakers must get this money from capitalists, who, in turn, must sell tickets. Because film artists resent their shackles, they often show struggling workers, greedy capitalists, and heroic artists. “Good” businesses are those where the artistic types have the upper hand, and bad businesses are those where the artists have lost.

In other words, films see firms from the cramped perspective of the assembly line or the cubicle. From way out in Hollywood, firms often seem like beehives or rabbit warrens, unfit for human habitation. We don’t see what businesses actually do – create social wealth and meaningful jobs, and provide means for all of our ends, from writing articles to. . . making movies. In fact, businesses couldn’t succeed in the long run if they ignored the needs of their workers and customers.

A companion Forbes article discussing the making of a television movie about Enron suggests that the medium is the message. In other words, films have to approach business as they do to make money. For example, the audience identifies most easily with the underdog, so the Forbes articles says that the Enron movie will tell the story from the perspective of a young worker fresh out of business school – “a rat’s eye view of the Titanic.”

But this can’t be the whole story. Film is a remarkably flexible medium that can tell any story – from the lowly assembly line worker in Modern Times to the rich and powerful Charles Foster Kane. If it can describe the intricacies of the mob customs and practices in the Godfather and many other movies, it can describe the intricacies of doing business. Indeed, many films do this, from salesmen in Glengarry Glen Ross and Tin Men, to currency trading in Rogue Trader and securities trading in Wall Street and Boiler Room. Even the package delivery business had its day in Cast Away.

True, it helps to move things along if people are getting killed, but that isn’t essential to a great and popular movie. Of the Forbes top ten business movies, killings are featured only in the two Godfather films. If you want drama, it doesn’t have to be worker vs. boss – it could be a businessman building a business from scratch as in Citizen Kane.

Back to the top ten list and what it reveals. Two deal with the artist’s role as social conscience. In Network, an anchorman breaks out of the capitalist straightjacket the network has him in, while in The Insider the CBS people do not always act so courageously. Six of the ten films deal with oppressed or morally challenged workers – the two just discussed plus Modern Times, Tin Men, Glengarry Glen Ross, and Wall Street.

Although Citizen Kane and the Godfather movies might be seen as the rare films that show what it takes to build a business, they don’t paint a pretty picture. The ingredients don’t include insight and creativity, and the result isn’t a better society. Kane inherits his money and his first newspaper. He builds his fame and greater wealth on dubious yellow journalism, along the way acquiring megalomania, and losing all of his friends. The oppressed worker in his firm, his long-time friend played by Joseph Cotton, gets to make a last stand against his boss by panning Kane’s girlfriend’s opera debut.

In the Godfather movies the formula for success includes murder and, in the case of the family’s brush with the film business, the severed head of a race horse. Most notably, in a move echoed more recently by The Sopranos, these films suggest important parallels between the Corleones’ businesses and the legitimate business they hope to be, except that the mob “firms” are more family-friendly, principled and exciting places to work.

Only It’s a Wonderful Life holds out some real hope for business on screen. Made by Frank Capra, one of Hollywood’s rare Republicans, Wonderful Life is about a socially responsible bank executive who does good for society. But Stewart is good not necessarily as a businessman, but as a person who happens to be a businessman.

Films’ treatment of business has significant social implications. Movies are very influential. They might explain why people are so ready to accept more business regulation whenever anything goes wrong, despite the fact that we know that legislators and regulators are also flawed. After decades of business-unfriendly movies, we assume that business cannot be trusted.

To provide a mechanism for thinking about these issues, I propose an alternative to the Forbes poll – a poll of the most, and least, business friendly movies. FWIW, my nominee for the most business-friendly movie is Other People’s Money. For the least, Glengarry Glen Ross.

Comments

Interesting article. As assembled, your evidence shows some anti-business trends in films. However, I think you have at least one additional step to take to support the expanded theory you suggest in this blog post, that:

"Films’ treatment of business has significant social implications. Movies are very influential. They might explain why people are so ready to accept more business regulation whenever anything goes wrong, despite the fact that we know that legislators and regulators are also flawed. After decades of business-unfriendly movies, we assume that business cannot be trusted."

I'm not sure that merely assembling anti-business films sufficiently supports that conclusion.

Films also regularly portray politicians and government administrators and agents as incompetent, corrupt, or evil. See, e.g., Dr. Strangelove; The Manchurian Candidate; One Flew Over the Cuckoo's nest; All the President's Men; The Way We Were; etc. (You mention this phenomenon in passing in your article draft, but do not discuss why any negative public attitude towards politicians created by these movies would not result in a desire for less political oversight of business).

If your theory is that films have led the public to adopt a negative view of business, which in turn causes the public to be in favor of business regulation by politicians, then it seems that you need an adequate explanation of why films which portray government actors negatively have not had the opposite effect.

In other words, is there any reason why film would be a "one-way ratchet" causing the public to be more distrustful of business, but not having the same effect on public perception of government actors?

(There may be explanations for film's operation as a one-way ratchet -- for example, political figures may be more often portrayed positively in films, and that may balance the negative portrayals. Other explanations may come out on further analysis. Still, I think you need to address this point).

Posted by: Kaimi Wenger | December 23, 2003 at 11:11 AM

Quick note -- I just realized I put in the wrong e-mail address on that last post. (I somehow combined my work and home addresses). If you want to further discuss this topic, this post has my correct e-mail address linked to my name.

Posted by: Kaimi Wenger | December 23, 2003 at 11:59 AM

Film writers often change the original story line to add an anti-business element. The TV version of "The Fugitive" involved a murder committed by a one-armed burglar, while in the movie the murder was a conspiracy by a pharmaceutical company relating to false test results. The conduct made no long term economic sense, but everyone knows pharmaceutical companies are evil, so that was the storyline.

Posted by: jimhanavan | December 29, 2003 at 03:25 PM

A friend of mine and I have been tossing around the idea of teaching a gen. ed. course that shows films with positive messages about business (and economics), or which show business applications which might encourage students to major in business. We currently are wittling down a very long list, but here are some of our best ones that haven't been discussed here.

"The Wizard of Oz" is well known to have to many similarities to the free silver movement to not be an allegory for important economic and political issues.

"A Private Function" can immerse students in the pain and trivial stupidity brought on by price controls.

"An American Tail" features emmigration from a repressive to an open society.

"A Beautiful Mind" deals only tangentally with John Nash's work, but it can interest students in a personal way in a useful concept.

"Indecent Proposal" is a good film for discussing ethics, morals, and the willingness to put a price on anything.

"Trading Places" underlying story focuses on the role and value of inside information to corner a futures market.

Posted by: Dave Tufte | December 31, 2003 at 05:21 PM

What a stupid comment: "businesses actually do – create social wealth and meaningful jobs"

Wrong Wrong Wrong The idea, plan, and intent of every business is to b*f* the employee as fast as possible, as often as possible, at the least possible cost.

As idiots like you have gained control over society over the last 10/15 years, wealth, income, meaning and now jobs themselves have been disappearing at an every faster pace

The reason: what creates what you are talking about is not business but distribution of income, which is always a political question. Our society would produce as much or more with slavery as with the present system of employment.

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