Dumb Cash is a recent, easy-to-digest film concerning the GameStop quick squeeze that introduced Wall Road to its knees.
PLOT: An novice investor who often posts on YouTube and Reddit bets closely on GameStop, solely to kick off a mini-revolution the place a lot of his followers spend money on the inventory, bringing it to an unbelievable excessive that prices the hedge funds who shorted the inventory billions.
REVIEW: Craig Gillespie’s Dumb Cash is a kind of motion pictures like The Large Quick that, whereas entertaining, will seemingly go away audiences fuming on the inequality of as we speak’s monetary markets. It’s a rigged recreation the place the little man has little or no probability in opposition to multi-billion greenback behemoths. But, the GameStop saga is exclusive in that it was a mini-market revolution that labored (for some time) and introduced some energy gamers to their knees regardless of utilizing each tactic they might to rig the sport.
This makes a great companion piece to Netflix’s extra complete documentary on the identical case, Eat the Wealthy: The GameStop Saga, which supplies a extra nuanced take a look at the story than Gillespie’s easy-to-digest good guys vs. dangerous guys film. Dumb Cash positively affords star Paul Dano his most likable position up to now, with him enjoying Keith Gill, aka Roaring Kitty, aka DeepF*ckingValue, whose optimism and refusal to be grasping beat quick buyers at their very own recreation.
For many who might not know what the time period means, “shorting” a inventory means betting in opposition to it. The hedge funds that shorted GameStop had been betting that it could fail spectacularly, however there are dangers to shorting a inventory. In the event you’re unsuitable, there’s no cap on how a lot cash you might lose. That’s about as a lot as it’s good to find out about investing to take pleasure in Gillespie’s movie, which emphasizes the story’s humanity quite than the nuts and bolts of finance.
Whereas Paul Dano is normally known as upon to play psychos and creeps, he’s tremendously likable because the good-natured Gill. Within the movie, he’s proven to have a good job within the monetary sector and works remotely due to COVID-19 (the film is about on the peak of the pandemic). He has a loving spouse (Shailene Woodley) and a younger little one, and whereas his early good points may have netted him tens of millions, he hung in in order that the inventory wouldn’t be tanked. He leads the terrific ensemble, which incorporates Pete Davidson as Gill’s slacker brother, Anthony Ramos as a GameStop clerk (with a largely masked Dane DeHaan as his boss), America Ferrera, Myja’la Herrold, and Talia Ryder as buyers within the GameStop inventory, after which Seth Rogen, Nick Offerman and Vincent D’Onofrio as hedge fund guys.
Everybody is sweet right here, with Ferrera exceptionally personable as a COVID-19-impacted nurse investing to claw her manner out of debt. Seth Rogen, as Gabe Plotkin, the hedge fund man who misplaced billions, may have been a cartoon villain. Nonetheless, regardless of initially setting him up hopelessly out of contact, he will get some moments of humanity because the film continues. Of everybody, the one forged member that struck me as maybe a contact too cartoonish was Sebastian Stan as Vlad Tenev, one of many CEO’s of the inventory buying and selling app Robin Hood. Then once more, after seeing the GameStop documentary, his heightened portrayal wasn’t that removed from the reality.
My solely difficulty with Dumb Cash is that at simply over 100 minutes, it’s (by necessity) a simplified model of a sophisticated story. We’re invited to cheer in opposition to the hedge fund guys, however because the doc defined, it’s extra advanced than that, as many people have pensions tied up in this stuff. Even nonetheless, the film does a wonderful job of depicting how Wall Road is a rigged recreation and that it’s good to come from generational wealth to beat the system. {That a} man like Gill was capable of beat them at their very own recreation makes for a compelling yarn, and certainly, Dumb Cash is a crowdpleaser in the identical vein because the director’s earlier I, Tonya.
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