The Informant!
The Informant!: follows ADM executive Mark Whitacre, and his turbulent relationship with colleagues and the FBI during a global corporate price-fixing conspiracy. What hits you first is the lo-fi, softly lit yellow hue’d, old-skool, late 1960s TV aesthetic that dominates the style – no film has looked like this for decades, which makes it stand out. To match this there’s a snappy, finger clickin’ jazzy soundtrack with a hint of old spy movie about it – no coincidence there. Damon is superb as the conflicted lead in both his performance and physical transformation – a tubbier frame, moustache and wig puts decades on him. The supporting cast are interesting choices given the number of out-and-out comedians giving restrained performances – but it works. The Informant! boils down to being a two-man show: one at each side of the camera lens. Soderbergh has taken a massive corporate crime story and turned it into a quirky little white-collar caper – and whilst it’s entertaining enough, the story would have had more impact as a flat-out documentary.
Score: 6/10
Hey dude, guess what? Yep, it’s weird similarity time again…
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Ha ha ha, never really surprises me any more dude! Deliberately avoid reading your reviews of films I’m about to watch/review in case I think I’ve already done it!
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Great review. I agree with you on many things. Personally, I enjoyed the look, the sound and the performance by Matt Damon, but I never was very interested in what was going on or entertained by it.
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Great review. I’ve always been on the fence with this film. I love Matt Damon, but I’ve heard this film to be very boring and absurd.
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“the story would have had more impact as a flat-out documentary” – couldn’t agree more. As it is, I’ll admit it, I found this to be boring as hell. I barely sat through it.
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Maybe I’m just boring, but I thought it was trivialising, and a tiny little bit ambiguising, a pretty steep corporate scandal – would have liked to have seen more of the wider effect, and seen the actual scale etc.
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I echo your sentiment again: “would have liked to have seen more of the wider effect, and seen the actual scale”. During the film I had the feeling this was a scandal in some backwater town company with a staff of 5. Don’t know, the film just didn’t sit well with me.
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I have to agree with Shaft on this one. The fact that I can barely even recall it isn’t good. I’ve seen it about a year ago and I just can’t remember a memorable scene; can’t even remember the plot actually. It had the cast and premise but I just found it flat-out boring.
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I agree with Lukok.
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