The Bear, Disney Plus, Wednesday
Sometimes you just know from the opening scene.
The Bear, which was released on Disney Plus this week, is the real deal drama.
It’s intense, captivating and original.
And that’s saying something for a show based on a restaurant kitchen dynamic.
The Bear, by the way, isn’t the latest in trendy meats. Rather, the title refers to the animal in the stress dreams of lead character and lead chef, Carmy.
The Italian-American is back in his native Chicago trying to sort out his brother’s local restaurant after he took his own life.
He had been working as an upmarket chef in New York where kitchens are run with a fascist zeal of discipline and the Michelin star food is incomprehensible to the kind of people who turn up at ‘The Original Beef of Chicagoland’ for a meat sandwich.
His brother Michael has left a mess behind for his brother to clean up, figuratively and literally - in the finances, the cleanliness of the kitchen and the relationship with his business partner.
His “cousin” Richie, the partner, resents the new standards and menu Carmy is imposing and becomes increasingly obstructive.
Carmy finds out he owes $300,000 to a loan shark (the debt has been passed on from his brother), the restaurant has a ‘C’ grade from health and safety and there isn’t enough money to even buy ingredients.
We open with our hero (who has that messed hair, tattooed look that places him somewhere between a heroin addict and a runway model) early in the morning, desperately trying to buy enough beef for that day’s trade.
He’s calling in favours, haggling and selling his own clothes.
The frenzy of the kitchen service is reflected in the pace of the dialogue and the speed of the edit as the team battle to make it through the day.
Like the best of drama, there’s something of real life here. The damaged but brilliant Carmy, the resentful cousin, the capable and ambitious sous chef and the unbending determination to put things right for a beloved brother.
*******
Eat The Rich: The GameStop Saga, Netflix
Netflix has come up with another highly enjoyable finance documentary.
Apologies if that sounds like an oxymoron to you, but Eat The Rich is rollicking tale of a crazed plan to bring down a couple of US hedge funds.
A community of investors and day traders got together on a social media chat site (Reddit) and convinced themselves that a failing brick and mortar computer games business (GameStop) was a good investment.
The traders, fuelled by bravado and free government handouts during Covid, ignored GameStop’s terrible trading figures and bought the stock, with the plan to “send it to the moon.”
The other upside was that the hated Wall Street hedge funds would be ruined if the stock price rose exponentially while they were betting on it falling to zero.
When a WallStreetBets (the Reddit sub-group) influencer suggested buying GameStop in the summer of 2020 it was at $4 dollars a share. By January 2021 they had pushed it to a peak of more than $480 a share.
It’s estimated short sellers lost around $20 billion, with one hedge fund, Melvin Capital, posting a $6.8 billion loss on the trade.
Of course, some of the Reddit investors made lots of money on the way up, but tens of thousands of late investors lost all their money as the stock inevitably collapsed.
The financial detail is well explained and the story is told with the humour and style of the Reddit chat group.
Pay particular attention to Rachel, Mickey and Derick, the GameStop investors and rappers who only agree to be interviewed if they can perform for the cameras.
