TRIBECA 2012: BROKE

Andre Rison in Broke.

Showing the money

By John Esther

A rather straightforward and somewhat repetitive work-in-progress documentary, Billy Corben’s Broke is a about spending more than you have – even when you have millions of dollars.

Unlike (other) hoarders of the one percent, when professional athletes come into huge sums of money they spend it as fast, or faster, than they earn it. An estimated 78 percent of NFL players are broke after three years of retirement and 60 percent of NBA players are broke after five years. Often rising from areas unaccustomed to great sums of wealth and thrown into a macho culture where money equals might, NFL players  like NFL quarterback Bernie Kosar, NBA small forward Jamal Mashburn and dozens of other professional athletes had no idea how to handle his (no examples of females were given other than parental financial abuse) sudden entry into wealth. Multiple houses, multiple cars, multiple baby mamas, and way too many kids, plus countless moochers, schemers, strip clubs, painkillers, and Janus-faced friends and family members sucked the mass cash out of the earner’s hands.

Consisting mostly of talking heads of the "victims" of overspending, the latest documentary by Corben (Cocaine Cowboys; Limelight) is more of a cautionary tale about letting materialism run amuck than a tale of tragic woe-begone for the big men and their money. The strength of Broke reminds us that if those great professional athletes making millions are vulnerable to poverty than who is not. Spend some, save some. It does not last.