With Ridley Scott in the director’s chair and Michelle Williams (The Greatest Showman) and Kevin Spacey (Baby Driver) in the cast, the recent arrival of the All The Money In The World trailer has landed with a lot of impact. Retelling the real life story behind the kidnapping of oil tycoon J. Paul Getty’s grandson in the 1970s, it’s shaping up to be one of the most dramatic films of the year.
The biopic looks set to feature some of the best make-up every delivered in a film, so we’ll be very surprised if the film doesn’t go on to pick up an Academy Award for that alone. However, Spacey looks incredible in the role as J. Paul Getty and there’s yet more exceptional dramatic delivery from Michelle Williams, so we’ll be surprised if it isn’t nominated in a number of categories.
Release date
All The Money In The World will be arriving on the big screen in the US on the 8th December 2017, but the UK release date won’t be until the 5th January 2018. That will put it up against The Greatest Showman, which is out a few days earlier in the UK.
Story
The trailer below seems to indicate that a lot of the plot will be told from the perspective of Gail Harris (Williams), the mother of the kidnapped grandson of Getty. Taken by an organized crime group, the 16-year-old’s ransom is set pretty high, but his grandfather refuses to pay the money.
Desperate to save her son, Gail must persuade Getty Sr. to front the money as his captors turn to more brutal means of persuasion. It turns into a race against time as she works with the billionaire’s advisor to broker some kind of deal.
Cast
Michelle Williams will star as Gail Harris, ex-wife to John Paul Getty Jr., alongside Charlie Plummer as her kidnapped son John Paul Getty III and Mark Wahlberg as the advisor liaising with the criminals behind the kidnapping. Kevin Spacey plays J. Paul Getty in the kind of transformation that Kaiser Soze would be proud of.
Production
Ridley Scott (Alien: Covenant) is in the director’s chair for the biopic, his first since American Gangster in 2007. It’s been written by David Scarpa, based on the book Painfully Rich: The Outrageous Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Heirs of J. Paul Getty by John Pearson, and produced by Dan Friedkin, Bradley Thomas, Quentin Curtis, Chris Clark, Ridley Scott and Mark Huffam. You can keep up with the latest on the production with the official Facebook page.
First impressions
Ridley Scott has had a run of good form in recent years with hits like The Martian, which picked up seven Academy Award nominations, and Alien: Covenant, which breathed new life into the Alien franchise. All The Money In The World is very much a different beast from both of these, but it looks like it may well be another big-hitting film from the director.
Kevin Spacey looks like he’s going to be ridiculously good as J. Paul Getty and Michelle Williams appears to be putting in yet another exceptional performance. If it all comes together as strongly as the trailer suggests then this could well be a must-see film.
