If there was a movie I felt indifferent about this year, Dumb Money was possibly it. Yes, the trailer looked fun; I like every actor in this film, and I was aware of the GME situation, although I didn’t participate in it. However, I felt like it was a bit too soon to make a movie about it, given how “fresh” this story was. And after watching this in the cinema, that would be my only big complaint.
Where Dumb Money shines is in understanding the Gen-Z meme generation. It’s hyper-edited, Cardi B’s WAP plays many times, and the word “retard” is used frequently… Welcome to the Internet in the year 2021, but honestly, not much has changed since. This story focuses mainly on the “leader” of this GME uprising of young people, who pretty much decided to beat the Wall Street guys at their own game. Now, I won’t pretend I still understand every single detail of what exactly happens on the actual stock market, but the movie explains it clearly enough that you won’t ever feel “left behind”. I would compare this movie to The Big Short (2015), except this movie is 10x wilder.
By embracing this meme generation, the movie precisely did what the people on Reddit did at the time – embraced their shortcomings and wore them proudly as badges of honour instead of pretending to be something they were not. You will see many comments and memes about “apes together strong”, and they call each other “retards”, but in this movie’s context, it’s almost a term of endearment rather than an insult. They knew that once this story got big, the mainstream media already had an idea of who your “stereotypical Redditor” was, so they jumped ahead and incorporated chicken tendies, making themselves into a laughing stock whilst making GameStop one of the hottest companies, at least for a while.
What I liked was that they didn’t just focus on Paul Dano‘s character. The writers smartly gave us several different people in different stages of their lives from many backgrounds. It’s easy to root for someone like America Ferrera‘s character, as we all know a mom who is just like her. No matter what she does, she somehow is still in the shit, but she never gives up and continues fighting. Her story arc was also the most heartbreaking, without going into spoilers. I also liked Myha’la Herrold with Talia Ryder, as their relationship was cute, and they provided the window to the core “audience” of Keith’s streams and how influential he became. I can’t forget to mention Anthony Ramos, whom I like more every time I see him in a new film. I can see him becoming a great leading actor at some point; he definitely has the charisma.
As I alluded to, the only problem I had with this movie was that it felt “too instant”. This entire GME saga (at least the portion this movie covers) only happened in 2021. I get that you need to strike the iron while it’s hot and want to make a statement about big corporations against the little guy, with a “little” thing called COVID-19 thrown into the mix, but… I can’t help but think this is too early. Even The Big Short had at least 6/7 years, where we knew much more details about what happened. Plus, the real-life protagonist kind of disappeared, at least from the online world. Wouldn’t it be better to wait a few more years, catch up with him and incorporate that into the movie? Because when the movie is over, it weirdly feels incomplete. Mostly due to the big corporations happily chugging on like nothing happened, but still…
But that is my only “real” complaint. I thought this film was much better than it had any right to be due to the people behind it understanding this generation the movie is about, the Internet culture, and focusing on several people from very different backgrounds living different lives, but ultimately, having the same goal – getting a bit more of that pie that seems to be shrinking every year for us, and each year, the rich get an even bigger slice. Somehow, this film makes that point without coming across as preachy, and I think that should be applauded.
Overall, Dumb Money surprised me on every level. From the great casting to the story and how they told it, I had a fun time. Sure, at times, this movie can be “too much”, but guess what? The world is too much; people nowadays have to deal with so much on their plates, and it reflects everything accurately. I wonder how this movie will age and whether we will look back at it in about ten years and cherish it as a time capsule of the “COVID-19 times” mixed with the resilience of the common people. I would recommend this film, even though I still think it’s a bit too soon for it to exist.
That’s all for this one! Did you see it? What did you think about it? Let me know!
Until next time,
Luke