The Informant!

[a_person]

The U.S. government decides to go after an agri-business giant with a price-fixing accusation, based on the evidence submitted by their star witness, vice president turned informant Mark Whitacre.

Trailer:
[youtube]0hxi-z3ZZBI[/youtube]

[Beate]

http://www.viewlondon.co.uk/films/the-i ... ewsletters

The ViewLondon Review

Review by Matthew Turner
18/11/2009
Opens Friday 20 November 2009

Four out of Five stars
Running time: 108 mins

Hugely enjoyable, frequently hilarious and superbly directed comedy-drama with a brilliantly written script and an Oscar-worthy performance from Matt Damon.

What's it all about?
Directed by Steven Soderbergh, The Informant! is based on a true story and stars Matt Damon as Mark Whitacre, a high-level executive at agri-industry giant ADM, whose accusations of attempted extortion by the Japanese are brought to the attention of two FBI agents (Scott Bakula and Joel McHale). Questioned by the agents, Mark tells them that the ADM bosses are involved in a price-fixing scandal and he agrees to turn undercover whistleblower for the FBI.

The investigation drags on over the next three years, with Mark dutifully wearing a wire and recording meetings in order to amass the necessary evidence. However, when the case finally comes to trial, Mark is diagnosed with bi-polar disorder, which leads to a series of ever-more jaw-dropping revelations.

The Good
A bulked-up Matt Damon (complete with too-good-to-be-true hairdo) is wonderful as Whitacre, delivering a comic tour de force of a performance that could well land him a Best Actor nomination come Oscar-time. There's also strong support from Bakula, McHale, Melanie Lynskey (as Whitacre's wife) and Tony Hale as Mark's incredulous lawyer.

The film could just as easily have been played straight, but Soderbergh directs it as a corporate comic caper with an intriguing 1960s vibe, heightened by bizarrely colourful captions and a superb swinging score from Marvin Hamlisch. This works perfectly and Soderbergh gets the tone exactly right, with the increasingly hilarious plot twists cleverly drawing attention to underlying serious questions about corporate greed and unethical business practices.

The Great
Scott Z Burns' script crackles with great dialogue and there are several terrific scenes. However, the undoubted highlight is the brilliantly acted, directed and edited scene towards the end, which serves as a payoff to Whitacre's constant (and very funny) stream-of-consciousness voiceover.

Worth seeing?
In short, The Informant! is a hugely entertaining, brilliantly directed and frequently hilarious comedy-drama with a terrific central performance from Matt Damon. Highly recommended.

[EthanRunt]

Saw it earlier this morning, everyone else queued for New Moon, an there I was, all alone watching Fat Matt Damon.

It's a damn boring film, it's poorly written, paced appallingly and the actors don't even seem interested, a complete waste of time, just with some great actors. 3/10

[Ms Thrifty]

Maybe this is another "Serious Man" in that it polarises opinions, because I saw it yesterday and quite enjoyed it. The plot develops at at uneven pace, but then, as it's based on a true story, that was a genuine limitation and not due to a lack of skill/judgement. One review I read said it had been made in the style of a "60's Caper Movie" which rang true. So if you approach it expecting one of those, you'll know what's coming and if you don't like them, perhaps it's not for you? Great supporting cast, too - some of them more fascinating than the nominal lead, Matt Damon.

[Beate]

This is a strange film. I saw the trailer and laughed out loud so expected it to be hilarious, and it wasn't. It was mildly funny in places, though out of the 7 people in the cinema I was the only one laughing! It is endearing though, and Matt Damon has got a lot to do with saving the film, he gives his character his all. It's based on a true story, and while it is hard to get excited about industry price-fixing (can't even remember what industry), and the pace is often too slow, the voiceover musings by Matt Damon ("I like the German word Kugelschreiber. I mean all those sullables for the word pen!") have a certain nerdy charm. For example he talks about saving someone's life in a restaurant once through the Heimlich maneouve, then adding, as if talking to a schoolclass : "You can get basic first aid courses at your local fire station". The film, though set in the 90's, has a strange 60's feeling to it, both in film quality and clothes etc. And about 90 minutes in, when you think it will be over soon, it suddenly picks up pace and delivers a delicious punchy twist to the story, which means a lot of disbelieving faces, upheaval and lawyers springing into action. And the embezzled sum goes up and up and up....

6/10

[ciro22]

Perhaps the problem is that people going to see the film are not entirely sure what kind of film they are actually going to see and that's probably the fault of the marketing - A very similar thing happened with Burn After Reading when it came out last year.

So the good reviews are coming from those who are seeing a film that tied in with their expectations and the bad reviews are coing from those who expected something very different...