‘Freakonomics’ uneven but engrossing food for thought
Published 1:28 pm Friday, October 1, 2010
The surprise best seller “Freakonomics” would not seem to be an obvious candidate for movie adaptation, but here’s one anyway. It turns out to be a valid way to approach a multi-headed nonfiction topic.
The movie has five different (and much-lauded) documentary filmmaking teams covering different aspects of numbers-crunching in society. Director Seth Gordon (“The King of Kong”) shoots the introduction and the connecting episodes in this multi-part picture.
These deal with the authors of “Freakonomics,” Stephen Levitt and journalist Stephen Dubnar, who address the camera (and each other, a little too cutely) to illustrate their theories. Levitt is a University of Chicago economics professor, and his ideas form the backbone of the different stories here.
Morgan Spurlock, the guy who did “Super Size Me,” predictably offers the most whimsical piece: a speculation on whether names can affect one’s progress through life. For instance, does having a name associated with African-American families hurt one’s career chances or does success have more to do with economic realities?
Oscar-winner Alex Gibney (“Taxi to the Dark Side”) tackles the idea of cheating, using the world of Japanese sumo wrestling as an example (there are statistics that unfailingly show where cheating is going on in this limited world).
It’s sort of an interesting topic, but you can sense Gibney wanting to get into the corrupt world of Bernie Madoff and other crooks, rather than sticking to the numbers game.
Eugene Jarecki (“Why We Fight”) contributes a summary of Levitt’s theory that the remarkable drop in U.S. crime rates from the 1970s to the 1990s — while owing something to issues such as stronger prison sentences and gun control — was significantly due to the national legalization of abortion in the early ’70s.
Levitt’s conclusion, that the absence of a generation of unwanted children reduced the crime rate, is compared to a reverse model in Romania, where abortion was outlawed in the early 1970s.
The final section, by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady (“Jesus Camp”), looks at the effects of financial incentives on ninth-grade students. The jury is still out on this one, which is why the segment raises useful questions about the practicality of paying for performance.
Almost by design, “Freakonomics” is uneven: The sections differ in length and the tone varies with each filmmaker.
The food for thought is scintillating, however, especially for those of us who haven’t read the book. And the movie might very well make you seek out the book, pronto.
“Freakonomics”
A multi-story approach to adapting the surprise best seller about economist Steven Levitt’s provocative theories on the drop in the U.S. crime rate, cheating in sumo wrestling and more. Uneven by its design (the segments are from a group of much-lauded documentary filmmakers), the movie nevertheless offers up some scintillating food for thought.
Rated: PG-13 for language, subject matter
Showing: Egyptian
