Paramount Home Media Preps Director Adam McKay's The Big Short For DVD And Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack For Release On Mar. 15

Paramount Home Media will have director Adam McKay’s Best Picture nominated film, The Big Short, ready for delivery to retail on Mar. 15 as both DVD and Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack editions.  

The VOD date is also Mar. 15.

The ARR works out to 95 days and domestic ticket sales currently stand at $65.7 million.

In addition to the Best Picture nomination, The Big Short also garnered Oscar nods for Christian Bale in the Best Supporting Actor category (his third nomination — he previously received a Best Actor nomination for American Hustle in 2013 and has a Best Supporting Actor win for The Fighter back in 2010) — Best Film Editing for Hank Corwin (his first) and both Best Director and Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay for Adam McKay (both Oscar nominations are his first).

McKay is the real surprise here in that his previous directing efforts have been big commercial comedies — Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, Step Brothers, The Other Guys, etc. — plus a trio of Emmy nominations for his writing work on such television entries as Saturday Night Live and Drunk History.

It must have been all of that experience from “cat herding” in the comedy field that made his script adaptation of Michael Lewis’ 2010 best seller, “The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine,” so compelling.   Comedy is the toughest to do and his are usually pretty funny — he did, however, get a Razzie nomination for the forgettable Bewitched (2005).   

If you want a thriller, then McKay delivered that here.   How about a horror film?  A horror film as frightening as any zombie apocalypse tale — then look no further than The Big Short, it is terrifying. 

If you are unfamiliar with the story — which is all true — as early as 2005 a somewhat unpersonable guy by the name of Michael Burry (Christian Bale) — who is very bright, but diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome — used his trading savvy to find a way to bet against the subprime mortgage market.   Boom!   $100 million in profits for himself and over $700 million for the investors who stuck with him and did not panic … the market collapsed exactly as he predicted.

Burry knew — and it was all there for anyone to see — that the entire housing market was being fueled by unsustainable loans and backed by “ratings” that were basically fraudulent.   

The Big Short also details how others (variously played by Ryan Gosling, Steve Carell, Brad Pitt, John Magaro and Finn Wittrock) tumbled to this coming crisis and found ways to take advantage of the “bubble” bursting by shorting the market.

Now take out all of the financial mumbo jumbo — credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations, etc. — and make all of these Wall Street players amateur astronomers who spot a giant meteor heading for earth.  They can see it coming, but government institutions keeping telling the public that it’s perfectly safe.   It’s the same basic story.

This was all detailed in Michael Lewis book.   Who just happens to be the same writer who delivered “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game” back in 2003 — Brad Pitt loved that one too as Moneyball arrived as a big budget film in 2011 and was subsequently nominated for Best Picture, plus Oscar nominations for Best Actor (Brad Pitt) and Best Supporting Actor (Jonah Hill), plus three additional nominations.

And if you want really scary, read Lewis’ 2014 book — coming up on its second anniversary — titled “Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt.”   He claims the market is rigged.   Really, who is going to believe that!! 

As to bonus goodies for The Big Short, which are all exclusive to the Blu-ray SKU, there are deleted scenes and five featurettes — “In the Tranches: Casting,” “The Big Leap: Adam McKay,” “Unlikely Heroes: The Characters of The Big Short,” “The House of Cards: The Rise of the Fall” and “Getting Real: Recreating an Era.”