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It’s Academy Awards season. Let’s look at the best movies for CFOs…none of which are current nominees, but hey, great excuse for our community to talk about the most badass movie for finance and accounting folks, ever:
#5. The Bridge on the River Kwai, starring Alec Guinness
No, this is not the badass movie – you gotta read down to #1. We’re starting with a classic Hollywood movie. You ask why? Because, my lovely financial and accounting and audit experts, you would never let meticulous get in the way of accountability, of what’s right. Just because you can build something – in this case, planning, designing and constructing a bridge for the enemy – doesn’t mean you should. Or then defend it. When meticulous is not paired with integrity, you just get obsession.
Incidentally, the runner-up oldie is It’s a Wonderful Life starring Jimmy Stewart, which exemplifies ethical financial leadership defeating greed. But I couldn’t go with a perennial favorite everyone’s seen a hundred times.
#4. The Devil Wears Prada, starring Meryl Streep
The fictional Miranda Priestly rules with an iron hand, but her character is nuanced. An iconic leader navigating the knife edge of a company best in the world performing against the unrelenting demands placed on the team. Uncompromising excellence and execution in a high stakes winner take all setting.
How is this relevant? The CFO role is the most fiduciary on the management team, most beholden to a high standard of accountability to owners and shareholders. If you are a CFO reporting to a PE fund owner, or CFO of a publicly traded company, you know exactly what I mean. Your CEO can be rah rah all day long. But at the end of the day, all investor eyes are on you: can you handle the pressure?
#3. Nope, by Jordan Peele, starring Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer and Keith David
Why include a horror movie on a list for CFOs? It’s this delicious moment when Kaluuya’s character realizes that, just as in most horror movies, the stupidest thing you can do is to blindly stick your neck out at the exact wrong moment. He sits. He thinks. Might as well be looking at the camera telegraphing he’s not about to do something stupid. He says…”nope.”
That’s you speaking truth to power – that’s what you do when a board member or CEO says you should do something flat-out stupid or career destroying. You say nope. Feel me?
#2. Moneyball, starring Brad Pitt, Jonah Hill, and Philip Seymour Hoffman
You don’t have to wonder. It’s the tail wagging, data driven dream movie for you guys!
And the #1 movie for CFOs… c’mon… you know what this has to be:
#1. The Accountant, starring Ben Affleck
Has there ever been a more badass accountant than Christian Wolff? It’s a tossup whether I’m more in favor of the first movie (2016), or The Accountant 2 (2025). Both are great. The original introduced the brilliant concept of the transcendent magnificence of an autistic accountant/financial analyst who could uncover the truth in the numbers, hidden under a blizzard of obfuscation. But woe be unto anyone who blocked his complete work. The energy here is introverted brilliance + moral code, CFO as hidden warrior. I liked #2 equally well just for the line dance scene. (Hmm. When we launch the upcoming interimCFO community, maybe we should launch a line dance competition…)
CFOs, you are lethal! You RULE!
What Are Your Favorite Movies for CFOs?
By the way, I considered lots of movies. I love movies. Wanted to include Dave, starring Kevin Kline. Kline’s character did a great job filling in for a comatose president of the United States, but the real hero is his personal accountant, Murray Blum, played by Charles Grodin. Blum single-handedly goes through the federal budget, finding bloat, misspending, incompetence. Unfortunately, 32 years after this 1993 gem, real life caught up with the plotline of a businessperson taking over the federal budget and attempting to root out waste. Nope. Not gonna wade into those waters.
I did kibbitz with ChatGPT and Grok after I made my picks. Frankly I don’t like their picks, which are utilitarian…they check the boxes of being financially oriented. Not sure they inspire our tribe. AI said: Margin Call, The Big Short, The Company Men, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, Rogue Trader, and Wall Street. See what I mean? Meh. I think I nailed it.
Email me at bob@interimexecs.com if you’ve got a better top 5 pic, or if you can name a fictional character from any movie or animation who you think perfectly exemplifies CFOs. If I agree with you, I’ll send you the limited-edition much-coveted InterimExecs red check fleece blanket!
