Margin Call First Meeting BREAKDOWN (Hidden Details)

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I do think Jared’s impressed by his background actually. I always thought his reaction is the realization that he’s actually talking to the smartest guy in the room and the smartest guy in the room is telling him he’s completely fucked. That’s not a good feeling no matter how successful you are.

I'm an Air Force aircraft mechanic. I've found myself moved into a job where I sit multiple times a week with mid level LT Cols and Cols that brief a General or two. This scene sits with me because I always feel like Seth.

I loved the contrast between Jared's response to Sam's "do you" compared to John response to Sam's "do you"

A lot of people forget the title of the movie (including the person explaining this scene.) The MBS bonds they are buying are bought on margin. If the bonds in their possession decrease in value beyond the margin limit, they will have to pay the margin. This is called a "Margin Call". Peter's discovery is they are closer to the margin limit than they thought and they don't have the money to pay the margin.

The cleaning woman in the lift is a nice touch. It emphasises both that they’re working well outside normal hours and because they carry on talking as if she isn’t there, that ‘little people’ can be totally disregarded.

One very important moment in the movie happens at the very beginning. Will calls Sam on his phone, Sam was driving, Will tells him that he needs to discuss something important with him. Sam asks will to just send him an Email. Will replies that "It will not be a good idea". Then immediately Sam understands the gravity of the situation and goes to office. IF Will did send an email, it would mean they had prior knowledge of the issue and forcefully liquidated their positions, which would look very bad when the SEC sits with them.

Great analysis. One thing I’ll say is that if you’ve ever worked in an I-bank, the roles here map so clearly into the IB hierarchy. It’s fantastic acting that you can tell it without anything actually being laid out explicitly Seth - Analyst Peter - Associate Eric Dale - VP Will - Director/ED Sam - MD Jared Cohen - senior MD, perhaps CFO, Global Head of Trading or similar

The first time I watched I was surprised the higher ups accepted Peter's discovery so thoroughly and so quickly. On subsequent viewings I realized they already knew ... or strongly suspected. That a bottom level Associate could uncover it meant the risk was too great to continue.

At 5:36 when Ramesh says someone else could figure this out, and Jared says "understood". That's not a tiny detail. He's not "moved on from defining the problem". THAT is the problem. The complexity of figuring the value of everything isn't part of the motivation to sell it all. The warning from Ramesh "that someone else could figure it out" is the prime motivator. They have too much money wrapped up in these mortgage products, but at that exact moment, they are still worth what they paid for them, because no one else knows there's a problem. The minute anyone else figures out it's a giant house of cards, the market panics and the value drops, leaving them bankrupt. This is the moment Jared realizes they have to have the fire sell, and get whatever they can out of the products, because they're on a doomsday clock to someone else figuring it out first. If they had some proprietary secret information, and no one else was going to be able to put it all together... Then they would have quietly sold off their assets over weeks or months, getting top dollar for them, and not instigating a market crash.

What's really subtle about all this is that John's actions were entirely planned before Eric even started his project. John IS acting with more information and he told Jared about it as an eventuality which is why 1) Jared is so rattled and 2) why he decides to call John so fast: John instructed him to if it happened. If you combine John's 2 1-on-1 talks with Sam, you realize that John saw this coming and realized it would destroy most of "The Street," thus eliminating most of his competition ("most of us aren't going to make it out of this one") and putting him at the top of the entire market ("here's gonna be a LOT of money to be made here, it's all hands on deck"). That's why he didn't care about the effects of the fire sale: all the people who would blackball the firm would be out of business; Tuld didn't HAVE to care about what happened. (Maybe Feudalism isn't an ideology, maybe it's just a lattice of practical relationships formed by the destruction caused by the most ruthless opportunist in a pre-collapse society) The thing is, Tuld has no conscience and by their last conversation, Sam realizes that he has never truly known his friend of 40 years and was completely taken by surprise while Jared knew exactly what he was the entire time because they're virtually the same person. I also like how Sarah took all these steps to blame others and cut them loose to protect her job and none of it helped in the end. They fired her even though she was the last man standing.

“The kid’s a killer” is a great line, because it shows how ruthlessness is rewarded in this world, and empathy holds you back. Sam works for Jared, despite having probably almost 20 years of experience on him because Sam is more empathetic. Sam cares about how a fire sale will affect his counter parties, Jared sees them as dumpsters for his toxic assets. Sam cares about his dog, Jared will compel his minions to go track down Eric dale the night after he got laid off and might be in mental health trouble just to make sure he doesn’t leak any info. Not only is he a cold, heartless wretch, but he kinda seems to like it. Almost like a game for him. While the janitor in the elevator doing honest work might be losing her house and half her retirement savings because of how the Jareds of the world play the game.

Demi Moore's character was looking to discredit the Quinto Character and bull herself up by doing so. It was when Quinto revealed his credentials that she knew the game was up for her.

FYI Jared's watch is a Rolex Submariner two-tone with a eep blue dial, otherwise nicknamed "Bluesy"

I really like the choice to keep Seth in the meeting, he clearly would preferred not attended at all and the other characters barely acknowledge him, and when he is acknowledged its to remind the audience that the upper management could care less who he is. In some ways he represents the audience, he is a silent observer to the meetings and has no sway over the choices made at the table.

I love the close, quiet early morning tension these scenes bring! It’s spot on for that time of the deep night where the spirits wander n wreak their havoc!

Can't count how many times I've seen this movie. I love the foreshadowing of Seth getting fired for literally the entire film. The slow realization that Peter isn't his friend, and is actually annoyed by him, Jared's "what the f*** is his name again?" And indeed, his what the fuck am I doing here expression in the executive meeting. This film is just incredible.

This movie should have won an Oscar 👏👏 👏

The two meeting scenes from this movie gave me flash backs because I was in meetings like that in my career in the financial markets. I am so glad that I am retired now and do not have to deal with this anymore.

I came across a number of clips from this movie and watched them in random order and then I bought a copy of the movie and watched it. Seeing the clips first took nothing away from seeing the movie whatsoever. The movie is great, the clips are great and I have watched it several times. It is that good.