The Fifth Estate

The Fifth Estate, the latest film by director Bill Condon centers around Julian Assange and the Wikileaks scandal that occurred back in 2010 when it published classified information stolen from the U.S. Military. The movie fails on almost every level in trying to make the audience give a damn about any of the characters, but the performances were incredible. That's the only reason I am giving The Fifth Estate two buckets of Killer Korn.










The Fifth Estate by Bill Condon, fresh off his directing Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1 and 2 look like a movie that's part Hackers, part the social network, and something akin to a documentary about the homeless living in abandoned structures. The movie stars the incredibly talented Benedict Cumberbatch as the man behind the creation of Wikileaks, Julian Assange. Benedict plays a character who you eventually stop caring for to hoping he fails at everything he does. Julian is portrayed as a megalomaniacal, paranoid, and lying man hell bent on becoming a star no matter who he hurts in the process. Daniel, Julian's partner on Wikileaks and the man who wrote the book the movie is based on is portrayed by Daniel Bruhl fresh off his turn as Niki Lauda in the film Rush. He's an actor who seems determined to become a household name.

The movie opens up with the scandal of 2010 and the publishing of the classified documents and cables of the U.S. military by the New York Times, The Guardian, and Wikileaks simultaneously. Then it immediately jumps back in time to when Daniel and Julian meet each other. Julian convinces the eager and hungry for any kind of action Daniel to come on board Wikileaks. He convinces Daniel that there are hundreds of volunteers that makes up Wikileaks. When he finds out that was all a lie he almost leaves but Julian convinces him to stay, and the thought of being famous didn't hurt. Those two men started releasing information on everything to police corruption, illegal elections, and banking fraud. They began to topple industries and leaders and were making a name for themselves by allowing whistleblowers a safe place to do just that.

The biggest problem I have for The Fifth Estate is that they don't introduce a character you really care about until three quarters in. By then it feels forced and it's too late. It's like the director and the producers realized they needed to show just how much pain Julian's scoop could cause, that they realized the movie needed a character the audience could relate too. They blew that one in a major way. Maybe had the character been introduced up front, maybe even before we meet Julian, that probably would have worked, but when you don't meet that man and his family until the movie is practically over, fail. The music was done by Carter Burwell, someone I have not been overly impressed by and that continues here. The music was forgettable to the point that I didn't care who was behind it. The cinematography by Tobias A. Schliessler was interesting at times, but there was nothing daring about it. The Fifth Estate is a movie worth skipping, unless of course you care how Wikileaks came into being and the men behind it. If you don't, skip it, see something else, and I'll see you at the theater.