MOVIE REVIEW: Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room

** stars

The words “economic documentary” and “sexy good time” are rarely used to describe the same movie, and despite a brief tribute to one executive’s stripper fetish, Alex Gibney’s “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” continues this trend.

The film is a relatively straightforward account of the rise and fall of Enron, the infamous energy company whose top executives carted away hundreds of millions while their investors and employees lost billions. Top executives, such as CEO Ken Lay, are currently under house arrest and await trial next January.

As most of the audience going to this type of documentary comes in to the theater knowing the conclusion, the film focuses on the people rather than the numbers, casting the entire story as a “human tragedy.” With careful attention to detail, “Enron” documents the stories of the fresh young traders corrupted by the system, the trusting investors fleeced for all they were worth, and the executives possessed of a seemingly bottomless greed.

The film is told almost entirely through testimonials, featuring interviews with everyone from a California blue-collar worker who saw his pension fund raided to former Enron VPs. The journalistic bent of the film is apparent in the filmmaker’s acquisition of internal memos, audio recordings and video footage that stand out as particularly worthwhile.

But the fun goes beyond bare investigation. Exciting scenes that get to the core of the villainy involved include Ken Lay joking about the California energy crisis, Enron traders talking about ripping off grandmothers, and a bizarre “video Valentine” from both Presidents Bush to former Enron President Jeffrey Skilling.

Unfortunately, the documentary leaves the viewer feeling that he’s only heard half the story. Of all the insiders interviewed, not one comes from the Lay or Skilling camps. The company’s top dogs are simplistically characterized as completely brutal, heartless, and immature.

The execs are labeled “ex-nerds” and are repeatedly compared to a clique of popular high school students who terrorize their school. Enron CFO Andy Fastow is unfavorably compared to the Cheshire Cat, and the description of executive Lou Pai focuses more on his sexual deviancy than his fiscal misconduct.

In the end, it will take a pretty keen interest in the Enron case and accounting practices in general to truly enjoy this movie, as even the human tragedy is centered on economic concerns. “Enron,” at 110 minutes, feels much longer, even with occasional oddities like the Bush Valentine.

These oddities, in fact, seem to be the result of a self-conscious effort to make the movie more interesting by the addition of material that actually strikes the viewer as extraneous and awkward amid the interviews. The trippy montage of pole dancers is simply disorienting; there is no call for nudity in an Enron documentary, whether or not it breaks up the monotony.

Gibney is fond of vertigo-inducing panoramic sweeps that show off his crane. Though they might be part of the mandatory artistic cinematography implicit in films of this sort, they just take up cinematic space.

Similarly, there is an attack on the Bush administration that seems less organic to the structure of the film than an attempt to associate the narrative to broader anti-Bush anger. The links drawn between the president and Enron are interesting, but the accusation that Bush let Enron plunder California to bring down Gray Davis seems controversial for controversy’s sake, particularly in light of the slim evidence used for proof. Many scenes smack of afterthought, as if the filmmakers realized they needed to liven up some of the more tedious stretches with political controversy, random shots of Ahnold, and T&A.

To its credit, “Enron” does humanize some of the marquee names involved in the scandal. But with the controversy already yesterday’s news, the filmmakers need to reach beyond recounting history to give a fresh perspective, which this film never manages. The smartest guys in the room will probably steer clear of this one unless they’re sincerely interested in Enron and want to see about 12 seconds of strobe-lit nipples.