Via NYMag:
Is WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange a traitor or a visionary? That’s the question posed by the new film The Fifth Estate, which stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Julian Assange, with Daniel Bruhl as Assange’s former partner Daniel Domscheit-Berg… [W]e also rang up Fifth Estate director Bill Condon to explain why he cast Cumberbatch, what he makes of the Edward Snowden case, and how he feels about Assange’s claim that the film is a “propaganda attack.”
Let’s talk about that title and tagline first. How did you arrive at The Fifth Estate? And what are we to make of a tagline that implicates the audience, saying, “You are the fifth estate”?
We’re trying very hard to make a movie that raises all the questions without providing all the answers. Even recently, when you saw what happened with the Snowden case, I think it’s hard to come down cleanly on one side because this is all just unbelievably complicated; only by getting involved and understanding the issues can people come to an informed decision of their own. I don’t want to make it sound like a history lesson, but I think the movie does show, in an exciting way, just how complicated these issues are. And the tagline, it has to do with the idea of citizen journalism, the great wild west of the internet. It’s a true revolution that we’re just coming to terms with…
Much more at the link. Since I loved The Conversation and Enemy of the State, this may be one of the rare films I actually pay to see on a wide screen.
lamh36
ok, now I feel bad cause I posted a movie comment in JC’s thread below, but it fits better here…lol!
Alright, here it is the first long trailer for the new Mandela movie starring Idirs Elba and Naomie Harris. Tell me what do ya’ll think. Maybe I”m biased, but it looks better than I thought it would right?
Amandla! Watch Idris Elba, Naomie Harris In First Full Trailer For ‘Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom’
David Koch
This is a BIG FUCKING DEAL!
Why isn’t the liberal blogosphere trumpeting this success? Do they dislike the President that much?
And what do the people who wanted to “kill the bill” have to say to New Yorkers who will see over a 70% decline in their insurance payments?
Yatsuno
This should be fun. I’ll go make popcorn.
Yatsuno
@David Koch: Sellout to the insurance companies, no single payer, worse than Bush, pick an excuse.
Ted & Hellen
@David Koch:
The president needs to trumpet it himself, along with all of the establishment Dems, in a prolonged, coordinated MSM messaging assault…but they generally suck at that.
It’s that messaging campaign that gives the bloggers and talking heads shit to babble about for weeks on end.
Whether intentionally or by bumblelitis, the Dems suck at PR.
Omnes Omnibus
Fifth Estate? Historically, not so accurate. The non-noble, non-clerical people are the Third Estate.
In addition, how would Assange be a traitor? Has he betrayed Australia in some way? He is an Aussie, right?
geg6
Ick. And that ick encompasses both this Cumberbatch dude, who I find repels me, and the deeply creepy Assange. I have some sympathy to what Wikileaks originally was trying to do, but it seems to me that it’s become too tied up with Assange’s massive ego. Kinda like how Snowden may have done something useful with his info, but that affair has become all about Glenn Greenwald’s gigantic ego and filling his pockets with cash from a book deal while Snowden rots in the Moscow airport.
Ted & Hellen
Oh come on…this isn’t complicated. Snowalden are treasonous, traitorous scumbags; the worst in history and should be killed by the CIA or whichever one of our many shadow agencies can best do the job. Then their arrogant, mendacious, greedy, self absorbed, dishonest, lying, avaricious, homosexual corpses should be dumped mysteriously at sea by moonlight with no pictures or film allowed at the proper time of the 24 hour cycle to make sure their religious beliefs are properly honored even though, you know, we just murdered them…
PsiFighter37
Wikileaks is running out of money, and Assange is holes up all day in a consulate. Seems like that worked out real well for them.
scav
@Yatsuno: Make extra please. There are multiple ways this could get interesting . . .
Ted & Hellen
@geg6:
It’s great though, that the man whose ginormous ego allows him to believe himself worthy of the most powerful office in all the world, is you know, not an egomaniac or anything.
BO is really humble.
Comrade Mary
@efgoldman: do you have RealPlayer installed? This can be in conflict with Flash.
Omnes Omnibus
@scav: Well, stupid, assholish dipshittery had already been done, if you find that sort of thing intersting.
lamh36
As to the movie you referenced AL, I’ll pass. I’ve become a Cumberbitch since Sherlock Holmes and Star Trek and I’d like to keep my lady boner for Benedict and not lose it thinking of him as Assange.
No thanks.
geg6
@Ted & Hellen:
Since when did Snowden turn gay?
And Greenwald is avaricious. Like I said, he’s cashing in while Snowden is camping out in a Moscow airport bathroom.
Yatsuno
@Comrade Mary: I do. Might have to take it out when I get home. I don’t use it anyway.
Richard
Since it’s convenient, I’ll quote wikipedia…
The Fourth Estate (or fourth estate) is a societal or political force or institution whose influence is not consistently or officially recognized. “Fourth Estate” most commonly refers to the news media; especially print journalism or “The Press”.
One presumes that the Fifth Estate was chosen as folks like Assange, bloggers and the like represent the next level removed from “the Press”.
Cassidy
@scav: @Yatsuno: Yup. I’ll bring beer.
geg6
@Ted & Hellen:
Hmmm, don’t think I ever said that. And there’s no such thing as a humble politician. Meanwhile, your hero is making bank off the risk and work of someone else. GG hasn’t done shit, ever. A loser and now a proven grifter.
Anne Laurie
@efgoldman:
I’m on FF v. 10, and not having problems with either the Adobe or Shockwave plug-ins.
(Upside of waiting on the “new, improved” laptop-to-replace-the-dying-desktop for the last six monhts, I guess!)
Nerdlinger
@Ted & Hellen: Are you this miserable in real life?
Yatsuno
@geg6:
Not quite true. He did defend a white supremacist, and not very well.
scav
@Omnes Omnibus: But any dragout knockdown kurfuffles over the accent are still to come!
Yatsuno
@scav: Are you saying Benedict can’t pull off an Aussie? BLASPHEMER!!!
(I suddenly want English muffins with back bacon, poached eggs, and Hollandaise.)
David Koch
√ Withdrawing all troops from Iraq
√ Ending the war in Afghanistan
√ Repealing DADT
√ Overturning DOMA
√ Regulating CO2
√ Raising car millage to 55 mpg
√ Rescuing the Auto Industry
√ Preventing a 2nd Great Depression
√ Reducing the cost of health premiums 70%
√ Ending rescission, pre-existing conditions, lifetime caps.
√ Bring health insurance to 50 million people.
√ Executive Dream Act
√ Ending gender discrimination in the Military
√ Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
√ Lilly Ledbetter Act
√ Mathew Sheppard Hate Crimes Act
√ Credit Card Reform Act
√ Food Safety Act
√ Eliminating banks from federal student loans
√ Capturing bin Laden
√ Reducing Nuclear arms by 66%
Brace yourself haters, President Obama may yet end up on Mount Rushmore.
scav
@Yatsuno: many on the Guardian thread yesterday were quite vocal on the subject in any and all directions.
Keith G
@lamh36:
That is right up there tied with mangina being terms that I wish I had never heard of or seen.
@geg6:
We get it. GG is worse the Charlie Manson.
eemom
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yeah, but c’mon, the actor’s name is Benedict. Have a little respect for poetic license, wouldja?
magurakurin
Isn’t it a little premature to make a movie about Assange now? Sounds like a boring ass movie as well. But to be fair, probably not as boring as Assange’s life is now, living in an embassy as a self-imposed prisoner. Dude has issues.
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom:
Don’t bring popes into this.
rikyrah
@GN192
Trayvon has been so degraded/disrespected by the US media almost none have asked whether Trayvon was RIGHT to have not led GZ to a 12 yr old
Keith G
@David Koch: What gives?
This claim…
…stuck out as being unfamiliar to me. So, I Googled. Nada
I am curious. Where did it come from?
Spaghetti Lee
Sounds interesting, but I’m still waiting for Glenn Greenwald in association with Greenwald Productions presents Glenn Greenwald: The Glenn Greenwald Story, directed and produced by Glenn Greenwald and starring Glenn Greenwald as Glenn Greenwald.
Anne Laurie
@efgoldman:
I got the one from The Conster, taken from your end of the table, but unfortunately you & your lovely spouse are out of frame!
Will post it
latertomorrow (just looked at the time), and see who wants to claim their names. Still hoping the one from the opposite side will arrive in my mailbox…magurakurin
@Ted & Hellen:
Hey, look there goes some little boys chasing that ice cream truck…you’d better run after them.
Helen
@lamh36: THIS!
Comrade Dread
Why are you distracting us from the real issues with all of this talk of movies about Assange?!? We should be talking about surveillence and drones and President Obush.
/snark
Crap. I see Ted already killed the possibility for snark by posting a serious comment like this.
scav
Oh, and for BC fans wishing to avoid Assange or just in general, this is available for about a week Nick Warburton – Last Days of Grace. Bit of an odd one (Cricket drama), but there’s still the voice.
ChrisNYC
Assange is running for Senate in Aus. He established the Wikileaks party in April. I figured it was prob his pre Snowden scramble back to the NEWS (b/c let’s face it the guy is hooked) but he says he’s going forward with it.
David Koch
@Keith G: from NYT
Yatsuno
@Keith G: Slip of the finger? I haven’t seen anything reported above 50%.
ChrisNYC
@Spaghetti Lee: You forgot accompanying himself on the piano!
Elie
@geg6:
And GGs almost daily pronouncements and threats are sealing off the options that Snowden might have. Every time he (GG) throws down another threat, he narrows options for Snowden to have a face saving exit from his predicament (in my opinion).
What may be interesting however is that GGs big mouth is making it real uncomfortable for Russia as well — perhaps the cost benefit of harboring Snowden starts to feel less positive from the Russian perspective as he (GG). trumpets the humiliation he wants to mete out on the US Putin may want to humiliate the US but this won’t do that. Instead, we start to see Putin as part of the puppetmaster of this… I think he wants to be much less obvious about it and definitely does not want to pay a price for this little side entertainment. Snowden better watch it… he may wake up in some strange place he never intended, complements of Putin’s prounouncement that ” he told us he wanted to go there” (fill in the blank of some country like Kyrgystan, North Korea, etc). Putin is entertaining a big summit in September and does not want the boy blunder still doing his sink baths in the Moscow airport by that point. I am sure that Snowden does not want to be the victim of an impatient Putin with other fish to fry…
Davis X. Machina
@efgoldman: I don’t care how cheap it is, it’s not the public option.
(Full disiclosure — I have really quite decent coverage through my union. This is what enables me to stand on principle.)
Kill the Bill!
Spaghetti Lee
I also hear Zach Galifianakis is interested in doing a John Cole biopic. I think the working title is The Mustard That Wasn’t There.
schrodinger's cat
@lamh36: I agree with your sentiments if not the exact words. I am waiting for the Parade’s End DVDs to be released in the US. Have you seen him in Forty Something with Hugh Laurie. He plays the eldest son. Its a TV show about a doctor and his midlife crisis when his wife decides to start working. BabyBatch was quite cute.
magurakurin
@ChrisNYC:
What’s he gonna do if he wins, vote by Skype from the Ecuadorian Embassy? Dude has issues.
Elie
@magurakurin:
I dunno, but I suspect he is probably not a great “guest” within the embassy. I may be wrong, but this guy was never never never, anyone’s “guest”… Their one relief is being able to keep him locked in a room and perhaps leaving the floor. However Ecuador may despise the US, we did not hear them clamor for another dissident asylum seeker when Snowden became available. I am sure that the thought of two of these to handle was too much….
Keith G
@David Koch: I see. So better typing would be thus…
That’s a good deal in that very inflated market.
Gin & Tonic
Thanks, AL, for mentioning The Conversation, an under-appreciated masterpiece of American filmmaking. Even though on current viewing some of the tech is obviously dated (reel-to-reel tape) it still works extremely well – if anything, perhaps even more topical now than when it was made. Hackman is superb, and that ending still creeps me out.
Pete Mack
It’s an idiotic question: how can Assange be a traitor if he’s not even a citizen or resident of the United States?
Citizen_X
What, the unconnected movies where Gene Hackman plays exactly the same character?
David Koch
@Keith G: Hate is not a liberal value
Ash Can
I dunno. This movie sounds to me like the left-wing version of Atlas Shrugged.
geg6
@Keith G:
Never said that either. Damn, you Glenn fanboys are stupid.
ChrisNYC
@magurakurin: Listen. A lot of very fine people have made entire careers on quixotic runs for office. Lyndon LaRouche is just ONE example.
(I just went to LaRouche’s wiki page, btw. His AIDS initiative in the 80s was named PANIC. Ai!)
scav
Interesting juxtaposition of threads.
Anne Laurie
@Citizen_X: Yeah, I’ll pretty much watch anything with Gene Hackman, but those are still great movies!
My google-fu is weak, but I remember reading that the director of Enemy of the State explicitly wanted Hackman to ‘re-do’ his earlier role, updated for more recent events. Also, here’s the Enemy screenwriter, from a post-Snowden NYMag interview:
A Humble Lurker
@Ted & Hellen:
Because it’s not like the President doesn’t have other shit to do, even if this one spends less time clearing brush.
Davis X. Machina
@Anne Laurie:
Someone tell James Bamford
schrodinger's cat
@scav: It is true, kittehs make everything better!
Keith G
@geg6: Oh Dear One, I am not a fanboy. I just find it rather tedious that a few folks here still feel the need to assert judgements on his personality traits – not unlike your need to characterize my comment with a personal evaluation. You don’t like GG. Fine. I understood that months ago.
Tedious.
Keith G
@David Koch: Which is why hate is not a card in my deck.
Cassidy
@A Humble Lurker: Did Sandusky & Ramirez figure out a way to blame Obama in a thread about movies? Is he now responsible for horrible film making and Cumberbatch’s long neck?
James Gary
Lest we forget, “The Fifth Estate” was also a 1960s pop group that had a Top Ten hit with their cover of “Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead,” complete with Renaissance dance break:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gT3QhfiGxRI
PS. 68 comments and no one mentioned this yet?
pillsy
I have an almost comprehensively low opinion of Julian Assange, but in what possible sense could he possibly be a traitor?
pastormaker
Apparently we Australians are now capable of committing treason against the USA. Amazing.
Tyro
Rap News, which has always been highly sympathetic to wikileaks had a pretty good time in their latest episode mocking Glenn Greenwald.
lojasmo
@Ted & Hellen:
I believe there were a couple of national elections which allow him to believe that.
Assange, on the other hand, not so much.
Fail.
tofubo
the fourth estate as of late has more been like the 5th column, hopefully they are not trying to equate wikileaks and snowden to the latter, they are more truly the what the former used to be