The Fifth Estate Review

The whistleblower has always been a controversial figure in both the eyes of the media, the government, and society in general. People like Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning have been called everything from heroes to terrorists, but no one has ever drawn as much attention as Julian Assange. In 2010, his website WikiLeaks assisted in the release of thousands of classified US documents pertaining diplomatic cables as well as confidential information about the US's involvement in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Whether you call him a hero or a terrorist, Julian seems like a fascinating person and after the leak every camera in the world was pointed directly at him. The Fifth Estate follows the story of Julian Assange and his partner Daniel Domscheit-Berg during the early stages of WikiLeak's rise to power all the way to the publishing of classified documents in 2010. The movie starts off with Daniel at his job as an IT worker at a company, he skips work early to go meet Julian for the first time at a tech convention; soon after Julian reveals some information to Daniel and asks him to work alongside him. Julian would be the face and Daniel would be the man behind the curtain. The first major story that WikiLeaks releases involves a European bank that has stolen billions from tax payers. After that WikiLeaks becomes a worldwide sensation, drawing thousands of people to their site every day. Over the next few years Julian and Daniel release more and more information that has been kept secret from the world. But over the years Julian and Daniel's relationship deteriorate due to different ideals and ways they want to take the website. After a falling out, Julian calls Daniel and tells him they need to talk. Julian shows him a video of US soldiers in an Apache helicopter firing at innocent civilians with no concern for them lives. They decide to post the video and become the United State government’s number one enemy, but that was just the beginning. Not long after another whistleblower gives Julian the largest leak of classified information in history. Daniel wants to edit out people's names for safety, but Julian wants to release it in its entirety. So there lies the question; edit it to protect hundreds of people, or stick to your roots and condemn people to death by releasing it in full. The Fifth Estate does two things right, Benedict Cumberbatch does a great job and the premise is very interesting; unfortunately the film does a lot more wrong than it does right. For the entire movie I felt like the creators wanted it to be like the Social Network; the problem is that the Social Network was written by award winning Aaron Sorkin, and the Fifth Estate screenplay is written by a guy who's most impressive credential is being an executive producer on fringe and is directed by the guy who brought us the last two Twilight movies. The acting in the movie is pretty bad, other than Cumberbatch no one gives a good performance; I'd go so far as to say the movie's co-star actually did a bad job. The dialog throughout the over two hour run time is pretty bad as well; which brings me to my next problem, the movie is long and often boring. The build up to the really interesting parts takes way to long and moves at a snail’s pace at times. On top of everything else it looked like they used quite a lot of green screen for some reason and the overall cinematography annoyed me. The Fifth Estate has been one of the most disappointing movies of 2013, what could have been something really great turned out to be perfectly forgettable. While it's certainly not the worst movie I've seen this year, I can't recommend it (especially considering how many great movies there are in theaters right now). By the end of the year, everyone will have already forgotten the Fifth Estate.  

Pros: Interesting topic, good performance by Benedict Cumberbatch.
Cons: Bad acting from the rest of the cast, poor writing, unimpressive cinematography, long and boring.

2/5 Stars