By Lee Pfeiffer
The good folks at Wall Street investment firms who guarded your money so well in the recent financial meltdown now have a new ideal for sapping what's left from your piggy banks: gambling on the financial fate of major films. The firm Cantor Fitzgerald is seeking permission to launch a complex plan whereby investors would bet on whether specific films in production will soar or tank upon their release. From the firm's standpoint, the idea is brilliant. Everyday people are always looking for ways to be associated with the glamor of show biz, even if it is on a dotted line basis.The problem is that, what most of them know about the movie industry is limited to what they see on Entertainment Tonight. As Mother Jones magazine, which reports on this story points out, the deck would be stacked among industry insiders who could see a flop in the making and bet on a film's failure. To ensure the bet pays off, they could manipulate marketing strategies and use other techniques to make good on their investments. The investment firm promises that they would hold "boot camps" for potential investors to teach them the ins-and-outs of the film business. (I'm not making this up, folks.). If nothing else, this would give them the chance to wring even more money out of the suckers who attend these Camp Run-a-muck's for attention-starved investors.