Movies - About greed

Movies about greed, making and losing money

Greed can also make for memorable films in which characters want, need, desire, and will do whatever it takes to have it all. Sometimes they get in over their heads in their schemes — which always makes things juicier — as we see in this week’s new release “Middle Men.” Inspired by the true story of the origin of Internet porn, it’s basically about a couple of guys who wanted to make a ton of money to buy more cocaine and hang out with gorgeous women at exclusive parties. Sounds reasonable.

One of the most basic things that make stories and characters interesting is a deep and strong sense of wanting something. So, it’s no surprise that greed, which is the intense and selfish desire for something, is one of the main themes of some of the most fascinating films in history.

Whether it’s the primary focus of the film, like in Casino, or one prominent theme among a myriad of complex ideas, like in Jurassic Park, the exploration of greed has undoubtedly helped in producing some really interesting movies.

Suspenseful dark toned movies about greed or anything money involved that causes unhinged characters to do crazy shit that makes the movie good and interesting.

There are movies about corporate greed. They all have one thing in common, immoral practices of business from embezzlement, fraud or capitalism on hyperdrive.

A clockwork orange
A Christmas Carol adaptations - famously about a greedy miser who goes through a transformation.
A Simple Plan (1998)

Similar aesthetically to Fargo, with its beautifully bleak winter landscape and Minnesota setting. But whereas that was a neo-noir, this is an emotionally complex family drama — a great example of people who aren’t as smart as they think they are getting into more trouble than they ever could have imagined. Bill Paxton and Billy Bob Thornton are equally excellent as brothers who discover $4 million in cash in a downed airplane. What should be a simple plan for the money ends up being anything but when greed and paranoia take hold. Director Sam Raimi ratchets up the tension as his characters make one bad decision, which leads to another, which leads to another …
All about the Benjamins
American Made (2017)
American Hustle
American Psycho (2000)

Corporate greed

The superficiality and materialism of the 1980s is partly the basis of this film. A wealthy, vain, cold, social-climbing investment banker lives a double life as a serial killer. The film pushes the ambiguity of the protagonist in question as an unreliable narrator filled with hyperbole and flaunting wealth. The movie and the novel of the same name were both controversial for the explicit violence throughout. It’s on this list because his job makes him delusional with what he can get away with because he’s rich.
As tears go by
Awake (2007)
Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Before_the_Devil_Knows_You%27re_Dead#Plot
Black Sea (2014)
Boiler Room (2000)

Corporate greed

A college dropout gets employment in a brokerage firm after running a small-time unlicensed casino near his former school. The brokerage company is just a get rich quick Ponzi scheme by telemarketing penny stocks of expired and fake companies to investors at inflated prices. The money of the investor is lost at their expense. This film has a memorable quote from Jim Young (Ben Affleck) in the boiler room a.k.a the sales floor.
Bonfire of the Vanities (1990)

Corporate greed

It’s not a great movie but it is stylistically 90’s. This film may talk a lot about corporate greed but it also is about political corruption, social class, racism, media exploitation and vanity from the 1980s. The plot is about a rich white woman driving alongside her rich and influential Wall street stock trader boyfriend runs over a black teenager and a spectacle ensues. There’s a lot of layers in this film yet very shallow when watching it.
Brass Teapot
Brewster’s Millions
Burn after reading
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
Casino (1995)

No One Can Stay at the Top Forever

Despite not usually being recognized as such, Casino is definitely one of Martin Scorsese’s best films. It’s about a low-level mobster (Robert De Niro) who’s tapped to head a casino in early ’70s Las Vegas.

The cinematography, editing, and legendary performances are all fantastic, but Casino’s biggest strength is its exuberant narrative about the tragic effects of greed and violence. It’s true that it’s somewhat similar to Goodfellas, another Scorsese classic, but it feels much less like an imitation and much more like an excellent companion piece.

This is probably flawed thinking, but Martin Scorsese’s movie always seemed like the little brother of Goodfellas. Still, it’s powerful stuff. The film stars Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci, but Sharon Stone is the one who got an Oscar nomination. De Niro and Pesci play mobsters — surprise! — who move to Las Vegas. De Niro runs a casino, while Pesci is his muscle. Brutal but really well made. And it’s all about the money (at least until it’s not).
Catch Me If You Can
Citizen Kane (1941)

Who better personified the drive for bigger and better and more stuff than Charles Foster Kane? Just take a look at Xanadu, the palatial estate crammed with all the crap the millionaire newspaper tycoon amassed. He rose from poverty and began his career as an idealist, but Kane’s desire for more newspapers, power and influence became all-consuming, until he died alone and shrouded in mystery. It’s the archetypal rise-and-fall story, and the larger-than-life persona of director, co-writer and star Orson Welles, both on screen and in real life, added to the intrigue. Plus, you know, it’s largely considered the greatest film ever made. No biggie.
Emily the Criminal (2022)
Enron - The Smartest Guys in the Room (documentary)
Eyes wide shut
Fargo (1996)

One of the absolute best from Joel and Ethan Coen, it won two Academy Awards: for the brothers’ original screenplay and for best-actress Frances McDormand as the plucky, persistent and extremely pregnant small-town sheriff Marge Gunderson. But the greed part comes from an inept scheme by car salesman Jerry Lundegaard, played by the tremendous William H. Macy, who arranges to have his wife kidnapped to collect the ransom. This does not go as planned. Darkly funny and starkly photographed by the great cinematographer Roger Deakins, Fargo is a film you can watch repeatedly and see something new each time. You betcha.
Fight Club
Fun With Dick and Jane (2005)

Corporate greed

An average upper-middle-class family find themselves unemployed at the same time and turn to a life of crime. Jane was a travel agent and she quits her job because she wanted to spend more time with her son while Dick loses his job because the company went belly up firing everyone immediately. This is an update to the movie Fun With Dick and Jane that was made in the 1970s with Jane Fonda and George Seigel. The company is updated to be this Enron parody called Globodyne. The movie is a fun, campy view of the downwards spiral of the typical American Dream template.
Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)

Corporate greed

“Second prize is a set of steak knives. Third prize is, you’re fired. Get the picture?” Ah, Alec Baldwin’s brilliant, brief takedown of the men working at a real-estate office is truly a thing of profane beauty. Based on David Mamet’s play, James Foley’s film is a hilarious, heartbreaking and ultimately scary look at the pressures to succeed, and the lengths that people will go to to try. “Put that coffee down. Coffee’s for closers only.” Man.

A real estate office sets out a contest to the salesmen to make the biggest sale of their career in one week from the head office representative. The first prize is cash, second prize is a set of steak knives and third prize is unemployment for the salesmen. A desperate salesman tries to scheme his way to the top with another coworker but things blow up in his face.
Gone Girl
Greed (1924)

This early American silent film shows the destructive avarice caused by the sudden fortune won in the lottery, and how it destroys the lives of the three people involved.

Its straightforward title may make it sound like a relatively simple film, yet there are few 1920s masterpieces as complex, vast, and bold as Greed. It’s an astonishingly well made portrayal of the most displeasing depths of human nature, and absolutely worth a watch.
Greedy People (2024 - recent release that I’ll highly recommend.
Goodfellas (1990)

A Coming-of-Age in the Mafia

Goodfellas is the true story of Henry Hill (played by Ray Liotta), a Brooklyn kid taken in by neighborhood gangsters at an early age, and how he climbs the ranks of a mafia family through the years.

Perhaps Scorsese’s most popular and acclaimed film, Goodfellas is a rousing masterpiece of incredible complexity where audiences get to see how progress, betrayal, violence, and lust for money and power slowly poison and destroy the lives of multiple people. It’s poignant, but absolutely worth the ride.
Heat

Heist movies… there are many, and desperation or greed are usually the motive.
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (1961)

Corporate greed

A musical about the rising career of a young window cleaner to the chairman of the board. The narrator is the book telling the young worker business advice on how to get ahead in business since that’s the book he is reading how to get ahead. There’s still betrayals, corruption and nepotism in the business world portrayed but lighter than most of the other films on this list. This play has many adaptations from was a movie in the 60s and a television event in the 70s.
Hudsucker Proxy (1994)

Corporate greed

A long-running company president commits suicide by running out of the window. The CEOs of the company decide to hire a “face of the company” while the CEOs run everything in the background. The film is set in a dreamlike 1930s New York City while being a fun romantic comedy about the pitfalls of capitalism.
Indecent Proposal (1993) - a blast from the past for you.
Inside Job
It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

This is a movie about money? Hey, it’s not all goofball angels trying to get their wings, you know. Frank Capra’s masterpiece is set in motion because, among other things, Jimmy Stewart’s George Bailey is broke. (Uncle Billy was of no help in this regard.) When you watch it, as you must every year around the holidays (it’s some kind of rule), it’s amazing how contemporary the financial talk sounds.
Jerry Maguire (1996)

Perhaps Tom Cruise’s most popular comedy role, Jerry Maguire sees the titular character, a sports agent, have a sudden moral epiphany and lose everything because of it, except his secretary (Renée Zellweger) and an egomaniacal football player (Cuba Gooding Jr.).

The film has fantastic performances, with Cruise and Zellweger sharing an amazing amount of chemistry. It’s romantic, it’s amusing, and it’s an irresistibly charming depiction of the quest for love and identity in an overwhelmingly materialistic and greedy world.

OK, all together now: “Show me the money!” Cuba Gooding Jr. won an Oscar for shouting that at several times during the movie. Well, that and some other things. Cameron Crowe’s film is about a sports agent (Tom Cruise) who sets out on his own, trying to do things right, and ultimately sides with love. Although Gooding, as an Arizona Cardinals wide receiver, gets his payday, too.
Jurassic Park (1993)

A 65-Million-Years-Old Adventure

Based on a fascinating book by Michael Crichton, Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of Jurassic Park (which might just be superior to Crichton’s novel) is about a wealthy entrepeneur who uses prehistoric DNA to bring various dinosaur species to life, creating a theme park that quickly turns into a nightmare.

This is definitely one of the most beloved movies of the ’90s, and for good reason. Its visual effects have aged like fine wine, and its story about the conflict between humans’ greed and nature is pretty much timeless.
Killers of the Flower Moon
Killer Joe
Killing Zoe (1993)
Knock (2017 - French)
LaRoy Texas
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
Lord of war
Man on Fire (2004)
Margin Call (2011)

So, this is how it all went down. J.C. Chandler’s fictionalized account of how a Lehman Brothers-like financial institution tanked, nails the exact moment in 2008 when it was too late for Wall Street to turn back. Kevin Spacey is outstanding as an executive trying to retain a little dignity and soul; Jeremy Irons is good as the reptile who runs the company. For all its insider talk and action, the film is surprisingly entertaining, as long as you can keep what it’s really about at arm’s length. Maddening, frustrating and valuable.
Michael Clayton (2007)

Corporate greed

This film is a thriller about attorney and fixer of a powerful law New York firm, Michael Clayton, coping with his colleague’s mental breakdown and the corruption around the major client being sued for toxicity over agrochemicals from their company being carcinogenic.
Molly’s Game (2017)
Money Train (1995)
Network (1976) - About corporate greed, satirically.
Nightcrawler (2014)
Oil for the Lamps of China (1935)

Corporate greed

Some people might be more aware of this story from a Simpsons episode when Homer moves to India to run a division of nuclear energy for Mr. Burns. But instead of India, it’s China. This film is based on the 1933 novel that was made into a movie two years later of the same name by Alice Tisdale Hobart. A naive man working for an oil company is sent to a remote rural outpost in China to work with terrible management. After getting married and moving overseas, he expresses desires to modernize the other country by his employment to this company to his wife. The man sacrifices the chances of happy family life to work of a large corporation that profit off of his ideas with zero appreciation.
Parasite
Pain & gain
Panic Room
Pride and Glory (2008)
Revolutionary Road

It’s about a couple struggling because they have to choose between wealth and freedom.
Run Lola Run
Sicario
Snatch
Slumdog Millionaire

It’s the story of a poor boy who starts winning on the Indian version of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” arousing suspicion that he must be cheating. Flashbacks show how he has come to know the answers to the questions. It’s great storytelling, and the final scene is joyous, but don’t be fooled. There is plenty of brutality along the way.
Scarface (1983)

We’re going with the Brian De Palma version, not the 1932 Howard Hawks original, just because it’s more fun. Admit it: You stop and watch it every time it’s on while you’re flipping channels. It’s such a guilty pleasure it’s irresistible — the clothes, the cars, the coke, that house with the giant, sunken bathtub and of course, the notoriously over-the-top performance from Al Pacino as drug lord Tony Montana. Like Wall Street, it’s an emblem of 1980s’ wretched excess. After all, Tony is told that the world is his, so why shouldn’t he want it all? Or as he so eloquently puts it: “In this country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the women.”
Shallow Grave (1994)

“Shallow Grave is a 1994 British black comedy crime film directed by Danny Boyle , in his feature directorial debut, and starring Ewan McGregor , Christopher Eccleston , and Kerry Fox. Its plot follows a group of flatmates in Edinburgh who set off a chain of events after dismembering and burying a mysterious new tenant who died and left behind a large sum of money.”
The Aviator
The Boiler Room
The Bank Job(2008)
The Big Short (2015)

Corporate greed

This film is from the view of four companies going through the U.S. financial crisis that was caused by the mortgage bubble bursting. The film discusses the state of business America was in. But due to its unconventional directing style, there’s segues, asides, infomercial explainer videos and documentary-style filming, the audience learns more about hedge fund management and finance. In one of the stories, the mortgage crisis was pinned down to of been caused by flippant irresponsible mortgage dealers and people collecting debt on housing.
The card counter
The Company Men (2010)

Corporate greed

Salary men are faced with downsizing amid the recession and must adjust with the sudden loss of income and lifestyle their jobs provided by downsizing themselves. The recession from the early 2000s is represented with poignancy and heart from people in the terrible position of sudden unemployment during hard times.

John Wells wrote and directed this film about a rich corporate suit (Ben Affleck) who loses his job, with the accompanying hit to his posh lifestyle. Chris Cooper and Tommy Lee Jones also are affected. They eventually figure a way out of their crisis (well, two of them do), and if the solution feels a little too pat, there is real fear here, fear that many people affected by the financial fallout will recognize.
The Counselor
The Devil’s Double
The Devil’s Advocate

with Al Pacino.

Stunning work.
The Founder (2016)

Corporate greed

The Founder is the true story of how Ray Kroc (played brilliantly by Michael Keaton), an Illinoisan salesman, maneuvered himself into pushing a small burger operation into the billion-dollar empire now known as McDonald’s.

Kroc is a despicable yet fascinating character, and his journey to turning McDonald’s into what audiences know it as today is a profoundly compelling experience. Well paced, sharply written, and with a few phenomenal performances, this biopic is a criminally underappreciated one.

This movie might make you depressed about the origins of McDonald’s. This film has three compelling and great performances from Michael Keaton as Ray Kroc, Nick Offerman and John Carroll Lynch as the McDonald brothers. The brothers make a concept of the fast-food restaurant that they perfected and tested but want to expand to different parts. Luck so has it a milkshake salesman finds their restaurant. He gives the brothers the idea to franchise the business which was very successful at growing and eventually pushing the brothers out of their business.
The Good Thief
The Godfather (1972)

“I Believe in America. America Has Made My Fortune”

There is little to say about Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather that hasn’t been said before. This crime epic about the aging patriarch of a mob family (Marlon Brando) who has to transfer control to his reluctant young son (Al Pacino) is praised by many as the greatest film of all time.

Impeccably made, the film has flawless visuals, a memorable score, legendary acting, and countless unforgettable scenes. Its story is an intricate and complex one, where themes like family, corruption, loyalty, and greed come into play. By the time the credits roll, it’s hard not to be impressed at just how great Coppola’s film is.
The Ice Harvest
The Insider (1999)

Corporate greed

This was inspired on a true story from a Vanity Fair article “The Man Who Knew Too Much” about Jeffrey Wigand conversing personal accounts of the bad dealings of the tobacco industry and company, Brown and Williamson for a respected television news program. It’s more make-believe than accurate but a well-acted compelling drama.
The Producers (1967/2005)

Corporate greed

A greedy Broadway producer decides to do a get rich quick with a nervous accountant prone to hysteria to create the most unwatchable, offensive, idiotic flop. They would cash in from the one night only flop by overselling shares to the production then skip town for retirement. The play was Springtime for Hitler: A Gay Romp with Adolf and Eva at Berchtesgaden. It’s a romantic musical written by a deranged ex-Nazi, directed by an uppity pretentious director who doesn’t listen to others and a drugged up unreliable counterculture lead on L.S.D named L.S.D. (Lorenzo St. DuBois).
The Last Days of Lehman
The Last Stop In Yuma County
The Pusher trilogy
The Queen of Versailles (2012)

Lauren Greenfield’s documentary follows the fortunes of Jackie Siegel, the wife of time-share king David Siegel, as they go south. Originally a chronicle of how they set out to build the largest home in the U.S., after the economy tanked (and the Siegels let Greenfield keep filming), it became something far richer: the downfall of the ultimate bit-off-more-than-he-can-chew player. It’s easy to feel superior to them, but Jackie brings an offbeat humanity to the movie.
The Sisters Brothers
The Social Network (2010)

Corporate greed

The Social Network, a biopic about how Mark Zuckerberg (played here by Jesse Eisenberg) created the social network that would go on to be known as Facebook, is one of David Fincher’s most unique and intriguing works.

Powered by screenwriter Aaron Sorkin’s witty and thoughtful writing, the film holds the audience’s attention from start to finish effortlessly, telling a story about ambition, jealousy, and betrayal in the most quotable, stylish, and intelligently structured way possible.
The War Of The Roses
The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)

Corporate greed

A profanity-filled debauchery fest of gluttony and greed. This film is based on the ex-stockbroker Jordan Belfort. A stockbroker opens up a firm to trade penny stocks from wealthy investors defrauding them of millions while living a life of drugs, luxury and expensive products. Things turn against him when the FBI starts to investigate him and his firm for their practices. There’s a lot of cursing in the movie (the most cursing recorded for a movie ever); but there’s more drug use than anything else.
Thank You For Smoking (2005)

Corporate greed

A lobbyist for a big tobacco company suffers a moral dilemma to continue being a soulless bureaucrat working to have cigarettes normalized and more profitable or be a good role model for his son. He also verbally battles an anti-smoking liberal senator that could damage business. This film has a swagger tone to the sales pitch efforts. The film is from the happy optimistic lobbyist point of view.
Movies - There will be blood
Throne of blood
Trading Places (1983)

Corporate greed

Two men unexpectedly switch places in life when two multi-billionaires debate if nature makes success or if it’s nurture. They switch out a preppy overly groomed snob who works in investment banking for a con artist living on the streets. It says a lot about self-worth and character throughout the comedy when the antagonists treat people like commodities. Pretty funny for a film considered to be a Christmas comedy released in July.

Ralph Bellamy and Don Ameche, filthy-rich brothers, go in for a little social engineering, betting that they can swap the lives of one of their employees (Dan Aykroyd) with that of a street-smart homeless man (Eddie Murphy). The subjects figure out what’s going on and seek revenge, with the help of, yes, a hooker with a heart of gold (Jamie Lee Curtis). John Landis knows his way around comedy, and this is no exception. Funny stuff, in an early ’80s sort of way.
Trainspotting
Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Triple 9

Heist movies… there are many, and desperation or greed are usually the motive.
Too Big to Fail
Two for the Money
Uncut Gems
War Dogs (2016)
Wall Street (1987)

Corporate greed

Every Dream Has a Price

This Oliver Stone crime drama follows a young stockbroker played by Charlie Sheen who's willing to do anything to get to the top, including illegal activities with the aid of a corporate raider played by Michael Douglas.

This was the movie that gave Douglas his first (and thus far only) acting Oscar, but the performances aren't the only thing that's great about Wall Street. With Stone's impeccable style, the story explores topics like greed and corruption through the confusing but fascinating world of stocks.

“Greed, for lack of a better word, is good,” Gordon Gekko famously assured us. “Greed is right. Greed works.”

Remember when greed was good? Michael Douglas won an Oscar for his portrayal of Gordon Gekko, the corporate raider who takes a shine to Charlie Sheen and teaches him the dark arts of financial manipulation. All very entertaining, though you get the idea some of the Wall Street folks two decades later used it as a training manual.

Well, of course, where else would we start? Oliver Stone’s classic epitomized the conspicuous-consumption mentality of the 1980s and provided Michael Douglas with one of his best-known characters and best-known lines. (People always get it wrong, though. Corporate raider Gordon Gekko never actually says “Greed is good” verbatim.) It also earned Douglas a best-actor Oscar, but truly, the slicked-back ‘do alone could have sealed the award for him. And it’s still relevant: The sequel, “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps,” is scheduled to hit theaters next month, starring Shia LaBeouf and featuring Douglas once more as Gekko, albeit with far less hair product.

A classic film about corporate greed and responsibility. A young stockbroker finds a job on wall street. He gets immersed in the corporate culture of the company buying and selling everything fairly well. He soon becomes mentored by the very corrupted boss that essentially teaches him to aim lower and sell higher.

Working Girl (1988)

Corporate greed

A young entry-level woman starts to work for a self-important businesswoman as her secretary. The young woman ends up having her ideas stolen and claimed by her boss. She constantly told that women should stay together while being plagiarized and manhandled by upper management. When her boss goes on a ski trip and breaks her ankle, her secretary takes over completely as her boss by impersonating her for an important client.

Links to this note