Is Uncut Gems a true story? The Adam Sandler film just dropped on Netflix
CRIME thriller Uncut Gems starring Adam Sandler is now on Netflix and audiences are asking if the gritty film is based on a true story.
In a rare departure from comedy, Sandler takes on the role of Howard Ratner – a debt-ridden gambling addict – but is the movie inspired by real events? Here’s all you need to know…
Directed by brothers Josh and Benny Safdie, Uncut Gems has been 10 years in the making and has finally dropped on Netflix.
Adam Sandler stars as lead character Howard Ratner and the actor already has Oscar vibes for the role.
Known for comedy films such as Happy Gilmore, The Wedding Singer and Grown Ups, the 53-year-old actor plays a stressed out gambling addict in huge amounts of debt, who has ruined his marriage and is shacked up in a bachelor pad with his mistress.
Looking for a way out of his financial struggles and to get the heavies off his back – he decides to try to sell a rare black opal he has illegally imported from Ethiopia for $1million.
The synopsis reads: “A charismatic New York City jeweller always on the lookout for the next big score makes a series of high-stakes bets that could lead to the windfall of a lifetime. Howard must perform a precarious high-wire act, balancing business, family, and encroaching adversaries on all sides in his relentless pursuit of the ultimate win.”
Fans have been left wondering if the film is based on true story and the directors have confirmed that it is – sort of…
The Safdies have revealed that the crime thriller is inspired by stories their father told them when they were younger, while he had a job in the Diamond District on the West 47th Street block in Manhattan.
Apparently he worked as a runner, taking jewellery from a wholesale dispatch to places like pawn shops and jewellery stores.
Josh Safdie said in an interview with The Wrap: “He worked there for seven or eight years. And he worked for a guy named Howard who was an outsider in the diamond district, a real character.
“Our Howard is not even a little bit like the real Howard, but there would be no our Howard without the real Howard.
Benny Safdie added: “It was an inspiration for us to think, ‘Oh, this world can be explored and mined for these incredible stories and moments that could only exist on this block of 47th Street.”
So not quite true-crime, but crime-thriller nonetheless.