Money Monster George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Jack O’Connell. Directed by Jodie Foster. Rated R. Opens Friday citywide.

Having a single background character shout “Occupy Wall Street!” semi-audibly does not count as political commentary, but that’s about as incisive as Money Monster gets about the current state of the U.S. economy. Dressed up in social relevance, Jodie Foster’s movie is really just an old-fashioned thriller, which is nothing to be ashamed of. For a good two-thirds of its running time, Money Monster provides solid suspense, only losing its momentum when it leaves its confined setting and attempts to provide big answers to the questions its characters are asking about corporate malfeasance.

Before that, though, the movie is a tense drama, starring George Clooney as Jim Cramer-esque cable financial-advice personality Lee Gates and Julia Roberts as his put-upon director Patty Fenn. A disgruntled viewer named Kyle Budwell (Unbroken’s Jack O’Connell) shows up at the studio with a gun and a bomb vest, taking Lee and some of the crew hostage and demanding answers about the shady practices of a company whose stock Lee had recommended highly.

A hostage situation that plays out on live TV offers plenty of dramatic potential, and screenwriters Jamie Linden, Alan DiFore and Jim Kouf capitalize on it well, playing up the relationship between the pragmatic Patty and the flamboyant Lee, as Patty sits in the control room and coaches Lee via his earpiece. Foster effectively utilizes the small space, giving a clear sense of where all the players are in relation to each other and what it would take for anyone to escape. Kyle’s rants about the state of the economy don’t have much coherence, and Lee’s graphics-heavy explanations of the stock market aren’t nearly as illuminating as the asides in The Big Short. But as long as the tension keeps building, that doesn’t really matter.

Unfortunately, the eventual reveal of why Kyle and other investors lost so much money hinges on the kind of corporate villainy that would have been right at home in an ’80s action movie, not the esoteric schemes of real-life bankers and hedge-fund managers. The third act plods to its disappointing revelations, but Clooney manages to carry it anyway, and he’s ideally suited to playing a shallow, charismatic man who grows a semblance of a soul. That kind of predictable character development is fine as background for nail-biting thrills, but by the end of the movie, it’s all Money Monster has left.