Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room

• Directed by Alex Gibney
• April 22, 2005
• Based on the 2003 book Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind

The story of Enron, its business practices, and the ensuing scandal.

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room is 2005 documentary that is a damning look at not only Enron but those who blindly supported it. It offers a nice crash course on not only how Enron came to be but how its practices brought about all the destruction that followed. It’s a fascinating look into a scandal that had reverberations not only in this country but around the world. It is a story of lies and deception and how image kept a company going and how the people in charge looked the other way because they were making money.

They start from the rather innocuous beginnings (as foundings of corporations go) all the way to the bitter end. But there is more here than just a history lesson. It points out the connections this company had to prominent officials such as George Bush or Arnold Schwarzenegger (before and after he became governor of California) as well as how they made and worked relationships in order to prop up a company that ultimately was not making money and not very stable.

If you went into this with nice thoughts about Ahnuld or W, then by the time the credits roll here you might think a bit less of them. They make it sound like Schwarzenegger was groomed as a supporter. And they clearly sucked up to the Bush family in general and George the younger in particular.

In more broad strokes put forward here what happened was a failure of not only the government to realize what was going on but of all the analysts and other people who should’ve seen how improbable what was going on at Enron was. They brought down not just their own company but anything they touched. Heck, they connected with Blockbuster when it was attempting to get into streaming. So it is Enron’s fault!

There is great deal of focus on Enron’s push for deregulation. They put forward their stance as being able to better help the customer, but it was definitely more along the lines of being able to exploit loopholes and make a buck. The narrative is equal parts disturbing and fascinating. You understand not only the financial devastation and how they caused it but see how the personal devastation was caused as well.

Those in charge were fascinating characters that feel pulled from a bad movie. Ken Lay was the son of Baptist minister who came off like a nice guy in the archival footage but whose dedication to greed made him not care. Jeffrey Skilling is the alpha jackhole boss. Lou Pai was an exec with a penchant for nightly trips to strip clubs. It was alternately weird and kinda bonkers.

There was a corrosive and free for all type of culture that existed within the company. They not only did whatever but attacked anyone that questioned how they were making money and how they could be turning a profit. Anyone that asked a tough question internally or took a hard look externally was often crushed in some fashion by those that ran the corporation. And in the end they were proven right demonstrating that a lack of introspection is also part of what led to the downfall.

The main problem with this film it relies at some points on the assumption that the viewer understands finances beyond the basics of daily life. Honestly most of what they discussed that involved how they cooked the books and moved assets when necessary for appearance purposes went way over my head.

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room is a fascinating documentary about a scandal that had global reverberations and to some extent still affects things today. This is something you should take a look at.