Dumb Money (2023)

By: Mike Ward on Thursday, September 21

R Running Time: 105 mins

SHOULD I SEE IT?

YES

  • The GameStop stock craze of 2021 is a great choice to bring to the big screen, and Craig Gillespie’s film has an outstanding ensemble cast to tell this story.

  • Pushes through with expediency and enthusiasm and attempts to simplify the complexities of the “short squeeze” that made hedge fund managers lose billions and young investors make millions.

  • Paul Dano shines in a great performance as Keith Gill, the former financial broker, whose investment tips regarding GameStop set everything in motion.

NO

  • A 2022 documentary, GameStop: Rise of the Players tells the story more effectively, more engagingly, and, quite frankly, better.

  • Covers a lot of ground and drags you with it, so a lack of knowledge of what the film covers with financial terminology and stock trading theory will likely leave you behind.

  • Disappointingly, in simplifying the story for a wider audience, nearly all the characters we are supposed to care about are one-dimensional and singularly focused on GameStop stock. The film falters in failing to make these characters seem like real people.


OUR REVIEW

Entertaining and amusing, Dumb Money takes us back to recent history. 

In January 2021, a group of individual investors brought Wall Street to its knees by driving up the cost of GameStop stock, creating a short squeeze, and causing chaos with hedge fund managers and investors. For about 90 days or so, as the world settled in for year two of a global pandemic, a different virus of sorts swept through the financial world and saw a number of Reddit users (and other folks) wreaking havoc on the stock market by massively boosting the value of shares of GameStop stock.

I’ll pause here to mention: If you don’t know what GameStop is, if you are unfamiliar with the concept of a “short squeeze,” or have never heard of Reddit and don’t understand the importance of “Roaring Kitty” or otherwise lack a general understanding of how stocks and investments work, then Dumb Money is going to leave you behind. Though screenwriters Lauren Schuker Blum and Rebecca Angelo aim to simplify matters, trying to bring as many viewers together to understand the stakes at play, director Craig Gillespie moves quickly and efficiently through this story. 

A decent amount of insider terminology and knowledge is needed to understand just why it is such a big deal that a YouTuber and Redditor named “Roaring Kitty” convinced many of his followers to invest in GameStop, a video game retailer struggling financially due to a decline of interest in physical gaming media and additionally buckling under the strain of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Roaring Kitty,” or Keith Gill, is portrayed by Paul Dano, who embodies Gill’s persona expertly well. Clad in cat t-shirts, drinking a beer, and wearing a bandana, he speaks with a hushed, whispery, but friendly tone and posts his balance sheet behind him in his livestream videos. In Gillespie’s film, adapted from Ben Mezrich’s book, “The Antisocial Network,” “Roaring Kitty” connects with his viewers, largely young adults who not only completely understand everything he says and how investing works, but, in this context, play loose and fast with buying and selling stock like they are playing a game on an app on their phone.

During the course of Dumb Money, we meet characters whose net worth has cratered and are desperate to dig themselves out of a hole and believe that “Roaring Kitty” can lead them to prosperity.

Jenny (America Ferrara) is a nurse trying to raise her kids as a single mom. Young college couple Harmony and Riri (Talia Ryder, Myha’la Herrold) bond over Gill’s guidance, desperate to find a way out of their massive debt. Then we have Marcus (Anthony Ramos), a GameStop employee who not only toys with his awkward shift manager (Dane DeHaan) day by day, but finds enjoyment in the prospects of getting rich off of his own employer. Schuker Blum and Angelo have written nice characters with minimal depth, caricatures rather than fleshed out, multi-dimensional people. 

The entire film finds the characters largely saying the same things - I have no money. Roaring Kitty posted on wallstreetbets! Should I hold the stock, sell it, or buy more? 

And on and on. 

(Quick note: For those unaware, wallstreetbets is a Reddit channel, or subreddit, where “Roaring Kitty” would discuss stock trades and investment thoughts).

That the film has charisma and energy and enthusiasm helps. Gillespie’s film wants to educate and entertain, and he steps away from making this similar to Adam McKay’s The Big Short, which this film will undoubtedly be compared to. This is simply a different kind of movie. There’s humor, but Dumb Money is never uproarious. There’s pathos behind these decisions on whether to click send or hold or do nothing with the GameStop investment. We see Gill’s small family - his wife Caroline (Shailene Woodley) and their infant daughter - impacted greatly by Gill’s decision-making. As a financial broker, money was a bit more secure. As Roaring Kitty, his looser, more carefree approach has the potential to have significant consequences on the people closest to him.

As the film rolls along, the people we focus on make a lot of money, life-changing money, but are conflicted on what to do with it. Cutaways to billionaire hedge fund managers, like Kenneth Griffin (Nick Offerman), Gabe Plotkin (Seth Rogen), and Steve Cohen (Vincent D’Onofrio), reacting to the market volatility is entertaining but an important subplot involving market manipulation tactics by retail broker Robinhood and CEO Vlad Tenev (Sebastian Stan) feels minimized and likely more important to the overall story than Gillespie allows.

There’s a lot to like here, which makes the fact that Dumb Money lacks the ability to make us truly connect to the experiences depicted on screen so frustrating. The characterizations seem to be painted with far too wide a brush. Dano is the exception, able to convey anxiousness, excitement and create a galvanizing presence. Dano makes us understand how people followed him, hanging and trusting on his every word. Though you will never believe that he and Pete Davidson could be brothers in real life, they share some fun moments together with Davidson playing Keith’s immature, screw-around brother Kevin. 

Perhaps it is no surprise that a far better movie exists on this topic - the 2022 documentary GameStop: Rise of the Players (streaming currently on Hulu) - which breaks down how this madness transpired in a way which properly quantifies the disruptive nature of what an army of young investors accomplished. In Dumb Money, we get to partake in a fun re-enactment and see an intriguing overview of the circumstances that took place. And disappointingly, the film also becomes somewhat difficult to personally and totally invest in.

CAST & CREW

Starring: Paul Dano, America Ferrara, Pete Davidson, Anthony Ramos, Talia Ryder, Myha’la Herrold, Seth Rogen, Vincent D’Onofrio, Nick Offerman, Sebastian Stan, Shailene Woodley, Dane DeHaan, Rushi Kota, Kate Burton, Clancy Brown, Olivia Thirlby

Director: Craig Gillespie
Written by: Lauren Schuker Blum, Rebecca Angelo
Based on the book “The Antisocial Network” by Ben Mezrich
Release Date: September 22, 2023
Columbia Pictures/Sony Pictures Releasing