The Fifth Estate

So I'm gonna try really hard to write this review without getting too political. I don't really have any agenda in this review to say anything political. Buy me a beer sometime and I'll talk your ear off, but this blog is about movies and I try to avoid polarize people on things besides movies

The topic of Wikileaks is a political mine field. Some people believe it's great, some people believe it isn't. The problem, and one of the reasons I want to avoid talking too in depth about Wikileaks is that I'm not 100% informed on every single factor of Wikileaks and it continues to be a developing actor in the world. I will say that you should take some of the messages (for and against, because it does ride that line but I'll talk about that later) with a grain of salt. Even the movie at the end suggests that the best way to figure out the truth is to do your own research and find out the truth for yourself. I would echo that recommendation. Alright, political disclaimer finished, let's talk about The Fifth Estate.

The Fifth Estate centers on the origins of the information website Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange (played by Benedict Cumberbatch). The movie mainly follows the relationship he has with a german man by the name of Daniel Domsheit-Berg (played by Daniel Bruhl) who had an uneasy partnership with Assange from the beginning. The movie chronicles their journey and the rise of Wikileaks, mainly leading up to the release of the largest data leak in US history by Bradley Manning in 2010.

And that's the best summary description I can really give because the truth is, their origin and creation of Wikileaks isn't as glamorous as you would believe.

If you don't know what Wikileaks is, it is a datasharing website that allows for whistleblowers to anonymously leak documents for public viewing. However, they make it very clear that this information is published over the internet and Assange and Berg rarely meet with sources in the movie.

Now while they do an interesting job at providing a cerebral imagery for the sharing of information and the "volunteers" that Assange states they have working on this project...

... the truth is this movie is about hacking.

Another side note, as much as people want to believe that hacking is super interesting and requires super fast fingers and keyboarding, the truth is, hacking is very boring and slow. And to be fair this movie portrays hacking (the very little we see) in a realistic, non-dramatic manner.

But my main point in all of this is that this movie is centered on a really dry subject.

It's a lot of people looking at computers, and talking about the implications and political consequences of these leaks, which they are definitely there. I went to school for Political Science so a lot of this was really interesting to me. But if you're looking for action, espionage, or even just some more fast paced movement, you're not going to get it here. While being accurate to both the idea of hacking, and the timeline of events (and even that I'm not totally sure of), this movie is actually a little bit boring.

This movie is two hours long but it feels like three. It is a very dense movie and while the intrigue starts early, it does take quite a bit to get this movie going and it is A LOT of talking.

Now, that being said, the talking and performances, actually pretty well done. And this movie has a stacked cast. I don't know if many of these people were popular in 2013 when this movie came out, but there are a lot of familiar names from today.

Obviously you have Bruhl and Cumberbatch, but then you have Alecia Vikander, Dan Stevens, Peter Capaldi, Anthony Mackie, David Thewlis, Laura Linney, and Stanley Tucci. You even ahve the Red Woman from Game of Thrones (Carice van Houten).

And they all work together pretty well. I won't bash the performances in this movie because I like almost everyone. I'm still a little skeptical on Daniel Bruhl. I don't think I mentioned this in my review of The Cloverfield Paradox, but he's always been an actor that I've heard a lot about and his presence in a movie always gets a lot of hype, but when I see him I can't help but be underwhelmed. He's perfectly serviceable in this movie, but he's just out shined by better actors, especially Cumberbatch.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention Benedict Cumberbatch's performance in this movie.

I think I remember back in 2013 when people were saying that they thought Cumberbatch was going to be in the running for his portrayal of Assange. I think those reviews might have come out before the movie came out and it got mixed reviews.

He really does do a good job though. The guy definitely has range and he's definitely portraying a complex character.

I think the interesting thing about watching this movie is watching it in 2018, years after the events of the movie and watching it within context. Like I said, this has been a developing story and we still don't really know the extent to which Wikileaks has affected the public discourse.

I do think the movie perhaps overestimated how influential Wikileaks was and it does kind of exist in a time capsule as Wikileak's involvement in the 2016 election is yet to be fully discovered.

I think if you were interested in studying more, this movie would be a good jumping off point (again with a healthy grain of salt consideration). If you lose interest after watching the movie, you've got a long dry trip in front of you.

Overall, The Fifth Estate hasn't exactly aged well, but it does give an interesting, and idealistic view of the work of Wikileaks and it's origins. This movie definitely does have a bit of an agenda and while it's not 100% for Wikileaks, it does bend a little more in favor of the movement than against it.

I don't think that should deter you though. The only things I think should would be the length of the movie and the pacing. There are very good performances in the movie, and if you're interested in the topic it might be a little interesting.

But it's not a really great movie that will bring interest to people who aren't really interested so I would say if you're not interested in the topic, you can skip this one. It's a bit of a slog fest. I think there are a couple of ways this movie could be approached and I'm not sure this is the best way. This movie is of course based off a book published by Daniel Domsheit-Berg so it kind of had to go in that direction, but I think it also could have focused on other elements to make it more interesting.

I think if this movie was made in 2018 it would probably focus more on Laura Linney and Stanley Tucci's storyline set in the State Department and show the larger aftermath consequences of leaks, especially those perpetrated by Bradley Manning. Personally I would have eaten that up a lot and they could have taken a little bit of an espionage angle to keep the movie going.

But overall the movie had a message to send out. I think that message is a little bit construed by the fact that it does try to share both sides of this situation and why it's political. But as it is, I would say only check this movie out if you're interested in the politics of Wikileaks or want to be. Otherwise, I'd say it's a long 2 hour slog fest that doesn't quite reach the impact it wanted.

But those are my thoughts on The Fifth Estate. What did you think? How do you think this movie has aged? Comment and Discuss Below! I don't mind political thoughts on this post, but keep it civil if you're going to do it and make sure you have your facts straight.

You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

Thanks, I'll see you next time.