Quartile rating: 7/10 · 1 rating
Documentary about the modern apocalypse caused by a rapacious banking system. 23 leading thinkers – frustrated at the failure of their respective disciplines – break their silence to explain how the world really works.
Four Horsemen is a competent and earnest documentary that assembles a range of economists, historians, and thinkers to critique the global financial system. Its plot/structure is reasonably coherent in laying out systemic critiques of banking, empire, and inequality, though it leans heavily on talking heads and familiar anti-establishment arguments that were well-trodden by 2012. The 'acting' (presenter and interview delivery) is functional but uneven — some contributors are compelling, others wooden. Cinematography is adequate for the genre with polished but unremarkable production values. Novelty is moderate: while the breadth of its interdisciplinary critique gives it some distinction, its core arguments overlap considerably with other post-2008 financial crisis documentaries. The ending is somewhat anticlimactic, offering vague prescriptions that feel underpowered relative to the scale of the problems diagnosed.