Director Craig Gillespie is taking audiences back to 2021 with the first trailer for his latest film, “Dumb Money.” The film, according to the official synopsis, “is the ultimate David vs. Goliath tale, based on the insane true story of everyday people who flipped the script on Wall Street and got rich by turning GameStop (yes, the mall videogame store) into the world’s hottest company.
In the middle of everything is regular guy Keith Gill (Paul Dano), who starts it all by sinking his life savings into the stock and posting about it. When his social posts start blowing up, so does 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.”
Dano, coming off his role in Steven Spielberg’s “The Fablemans” last year, is at the center of the trailer. His Keith Gill may be the ultimate underdog but is perceived as a joke by the Wall Street hoi polloi. We get glimpses of the likes of Sebastian Stan — a Gillespie regular — as well as Nick Offerman, Pete Davidson and Shailene Woodley, playing Keith’s wife.
It’s not surprising this is based on a book by author Ben Mezrich, who penned the book that would eventually be turned into Aaron Sorkin’s “The Social Network.” Mezrich’s “The Antisocial Network” goes in-depth into the GameStop short squeeze and there’s a similar rapidity to the trailer that feels akin to Sorkin’s tale. Interestingly, the Winklevoss twins — whose story was detailed in “The Social Network,” are executive producers on this project.
“Dumb Money” is written by Lauren Schuker Blum and Rebecca Angelo, making their feature film screenwriting debuts. Aaron Ryder, Teddy Schwarzman and Craig Gillespie act as producers, while Michael Heimler, John Friedberg, Johnny Holland, Ben Mezrich, Lauren Schuker Blum, Andrew Swett, Rebecca Angelo, Kevin Ulrich are executive producers.
Hollywood is having a bit of a scandal nostalgia lovefest of late, whether that be Gillespie’s “Pam and Tommy” and “I, Tonya” or Hulu’s “The Dropout.” On the film side Apple TV+ is debuting their upcoming look at the Beanie Baby frenzy, “The Beanie Bubble,” later this year. Revisiting stories like these often give audiences an opportunity to either learn about the scandal they missed or realize something about it they didn’t know. Considering only two years has passed since the GameStop short squeeze, it’ll be interesting to see how audiences respond to something that happened so recently.
You can watch the full trailer above.
“Dumb Money” hits theaters September 22.
