TIFF 2023 | Movie Review: "Dumb Money" Is Rich In Fun Crowd Pleasing Entertainment
10/12 ForReel Score | 4/5 Stars
The GameStop scandal is a moment in recent pop culture history that writes its own movie. In the midst of the pandemic, many of us were tuned in to the events unfolding online right in front of us that saw average citizens not just trade stocks, but buy into a movement.
And we all watched the system shift to align itself in favor of the rich.
Recent history might act as a bitter top-of-mind spoiler alert for what happens with the primary conflict of Dumb Money, but the story that writer and director Craig Gillespie has captured for this film nonetheless is a fun, entertaining, and heartfelt look at what happened and its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival serves as a proper welcome into the Fall film season.
Image courtesy of TIFF
Dumb Money juggles a number of narratives - a nurse and single mother named Jenny (America Ferrera) buried in crippling debt, two college girls named Riri (Myha'la Herrold) and Harmony (Talia Ryder) with major student loans that will need to be repaid, and a GameStop worker named Marcos (Anthony Ramos) barely making ends meet with the dead-end job he puts up with. But the focal point of it all is Keith Gill, aka Roaring Kitty played by Paul Dano, who uses his finance background and small YouTube channel to flag the underestimated nature of the GameStop stock.
As the narrative traverses the ups and downs of the escalating situation, with businessman Gabe Plotkin played by Seth Rogan serving as the film’s tangible antagonist, Keith’s story acts as a compelling and emotional anchor for the narrative. Between the struggles of becoming a famous online personality, grieving for the recent death of his sister, and the weight of haphazardly becoming the leader of a social movement, Keith’s story in Dumb Money provides the film with engrossing context on who this character is and how he made the most of this opportunity despite the challenges.
Dumb Money, with all of the highs and lows of the stories at hand, certainly works well as a crowd pleasing film. It takes what many might consider a complicated topic and makes it easy to consume for any average moviegoer, and that is key to why Dumb Money can be so entertaining. The film is great at immersing audiences in the precarious positions that the characters find themselves in while trying to make risky decisions. In this movie, we are in on the gamble with the characters, and there’s a fun heart-thumping tension that comes with being invested in their plights.
Image courtesy of TIFF
This easy-to-digest formula, however, does come with its shortfalls. Watching all narratives ride the same waves of elation and disappointment can be unnecessarily repetitive. These stories lack their own independent depth, and where a film like The Big Short sees a similar structure send their narratives down similar yet distinct and gripping storylines, Dumb Money’s multi-narrative approach can come off as diversity for just for diversity’s sake.
This, ultimately, is a minor trade off for ensuring a more universally approachable film. In a year of acclaimed pop culture phenomenon films like Air and BlackBerry, Dumb Money enters the ring at probably the most optimal time of the year for attention from audiences. Although the film’s World Premiere was void of any actors because of the ongoing actors strike, the ensemble cast and the high profile story are both compelling enough to make Dumb Money worth recommending.
Acting/Casting - 2 | Visual Effects and Editing - 2 | Story and Message - 1 | Entertainment Value - 2 | Music Score and Soundtrack - 1 | Reviewer’s Preference - 2 | What does this mean?