Dumb Money
Internet commenter Keith Gill sinks his life savings into GameStop stock and posts about it. When his social posts start blowing up, so do his life and the lives of everyone following him. As a stock tip becomes a movement, everyone gets rich—until the billionaires fight back, and both sides find their worlds turned upside down.
- Released: 2023-10-20
- Runtime: 105 minutes
- Genre: Comedy, Drama, History
- Stars: Paul Dano, Seth Rogen, Sebastian Stan, Pete Davidson, Shailene Woodley, Anthony Ramos, Vincent D'Onofrio, Dane DeHaan, Myha'la Herrold, America Ferrera, Nick Offerman, Talia Ryder, Olivia Thirlby, Kate Burton, Clancy Brown
- Director: Craig Gillespie
Comments
- scott-71895 - 14 June 2024
Be yourself.
A great story told in the dullest, most inauthentic way possible.
The entire film really blatantly rips off David Fincher's aesthetics in a way that doesn't play to Craig Gillespe's strengths, making it feel more like a pale imitation of the Social Network than an authentic, sincere artistic statement. They even hired one of David's normal editors, weren't hiding it, but didn't get the results they wanted because none of the footage works. It's all stilted and awkward yet weirdly smooth and uninteresting. Music was a knockoff. It's also dark and unpleasant to look at for most of it, you can't imitate Fincher's lighting/color but not plan it with any psychology. Just was terrible and felt cheap to sit in.
I had none of these problems with I, Tonya, I don't know where that filmmaker went.
It somehow comes across as having no energy or panache despite being about what was a pretty exciting event. Despite that it moves quickly, so all feels like a long montage of short scenes - which sometimes works (The Big Short kind of fits this description) but it's all so bland and surface level none of it leaves an impression. Most of the actual Wall Street Bets content is shown in *literal* montages, at one point it's just a clip of Colbert explaining what's happening. Really lazy and on autopilot. Could be worse but it's so mediocre that it's painful.
The actors also felt weirdly miscast (aside from Paul Dano and Clancy Brown who are always great). Idk if this is judging too much but you didn't get the impression they'd have any interest in this kind of thing (especially the actors for the college kids). Led to a lot of awkward cringy moments, especially considering it all felt scripted and not improvised (again, this style isn't playing to Craig's strengths).
It was weird seeing Seth Rogan criticize a guy for having a $400 million net worth when he himself has $80 million according to some sources. I'm not buying that he's living the same experience as an average person.
Why was Nick Offerman, of the coolest actors in the world, playing Ken Griffith ? Of all people.
It was kind of funny to see Shailene Woodley play the "supportive wife" archetype the same as in Snowden, she's fine but kind of downplays things to the point her character doesn't have natural reactions to what's happening. Feels like her real life equivalent would be more interesting.
Uncomfortable with the advice giving flamboyant black friend side character stereotype. Make them an investor, why wouldn't that be more interesting.
Anthony Ramos and Dane DeHaan also had some weirdly bizarre and hostile conversations, I've been in toxic work environments before but the writing's so stilted about everything it comes off unnatural and uncomfortable.
Also while I support the movement in large the whole mocking autistic people thing was glossed over really hard and kind of reinforced. They've moved beyond that recently. Worth like a 20 second conversation at least.
Also really poor and repetitive music choices throughout, make the actual content fun and interesting instead of trying to force it with music. The songs date it really quickly as well.
It's a great story so that holds it afloat, it's just a waste of time that could've been incredible done differently. - micah-mysiuk - 22 March 2024
Another stock market movie - from a Wall St guy
This is the third stock market movie based on events I lived thru. This one I had a more inside view than the others, having traded on Discord servers from 2019-2022. The real story is far more sinister and depressing than the one portrayed in the film. GME is trading around $12 as I'm writing this review. Adam Aaron fleeced the hell out of the AMC investors. "Dumb Money" still lost in the end.
If you're looking for a surface level understanding of the events that took place around the GameStock event, this is the movie for you.
Don't take it too serious. Understand it's not accurate. Not a bad movie.
Check youtube dot com slash watch?v=rejpDqQUcV0 to see what it was like hanging with the Tendieman. - SaidNDone - 13 February 2024
The Soviets Would Be Proud
"Dumb Money" is a Soviet level propaganda piece that spins what was essentially a decentralized pyramid scheme that ruined millions into a populist narrative of David vs Goliath. The actual story is a bunch of retail suckers bid up the common stock of a dead company far beyond its intrinsic value then got screwed when their own cult leaders pulled the rug out from under them.
The rest is nothing more than a bunch of flunkies fingerpointing as they don't want to take responsibility for their own decision to invest in a terrible company because they fell for memes posted by 15 year olds nor take responsibility for their decision to do so via a 5th rate broker because it had a pretty UI.
The movie obfuscates the facts of the matter to a startling degree including:- Implying Robinhood turning off GME trading was due to a conspiracy with Citadel. When the news broke that Robinhood turned off GME trading I (and everyone else with any industry knowledge) knew instantly it was because the fools didn't have collateral to match the huge GME volume they were pumping through DTCC as they focused more on their UI than their backoffice.
- Furthermore both Citadel Securities and Robinhood were printing money like no tomorrow off retail GME trades. They only had incentive to drive further volume. Citadel Securities and Citadel Investments are completely separate companies with a Chinese wall between them. And no one at Citadel Securities was going to risk their bonuses or jail to help grease the returns of a tiny fund Citadel Investments put a few basis points of AUM into. In-fact the movie's own obsession with PFOF should have been a hint to this incentive structure...
- Representing the GME movement as a success when the vast majority of people who fell into the pyramid scheme lost money, mostly to the fellow 'apes' they trusted.
The reality is from day 1 the media displayed a shocking lack of knowledge and penchant for pumping fake news when it came to this event -- likely resulting in not only the ruin of hundreds of thousands but massive amounts of misplaced rage -- and this movie is nothing more than a continuation of that.
