The Fifth Estate (2013)

The fifth estate is a fascinating cross between a documentary and a film. Which ever it is it is an amazing insight into the lives of the people who were and many still are, trying to expose the entire truth, or their opinion of the entire truth. Although Wiki Leaks may be seen as a the whole truth to some and to others it seems like the biggest breach of privacy and invasion to people's lives on the planet. I imagine that finding a way to write this film without having an obvious bias to the subject was incredibly difficult, probably even more so for the actors. However, The Fifth Estate is amazingly neutral in the way it is written, and this is mainly due to the script being based on a book written by one of the men closest to the 'who you think would be' protagonist Julian Assange. The main character in fact his 'sidekick' Daniel Domscheit-Berg, due to the fact that the book written by him and from his perspective. This I wasn't expecting, as the ad campaign and posters were all angled at Assange (played by Benedict Cumberbatch). This was actually because Assange himself discredited the movie suggesting that through one person's eyes is not the entire truth. Although, journalists at the guardian countered this and said the movie depicts events in their actuality. The film starts in late 2010, with the largest leak of US documents on the planet. The opening scene has journalists from the guardian, the New York Times and Der Spiegel rushing about trying to publish the story in unison. The clock then rewinds to find Cumberbatch (playing Assange), wondering into a hacking convention and giving a talk to five people. Here he officially starts working with Daniel and the star studded cast, from here starts to put the pieces of the timeline together from the initial meeting to the biggest leak ever in history. Cumberbatch as Assange is creepily accurate in his depiction according to sources at the Guardian. He is also is incredibly close vocally to the Assange, changing his smooth English vocal tones into the lisped Australian ramble of the infamous man himself. Assange is an interesting mix of cunning and innocent, as he trusts Daniel with great ease, but at other times is incredibly guarded. The character of Assange is also very arrogant thinking that he also is very important compared to other people and very contradictory in his approach to the profile of the website. The character of Daniel is played by Daniel Bruhl, who is personally one of my favourite actors at the moment. He is the character which the film is based around, it bases around his life, how the website affects his relationships with other people. The film shows his relationship was Assange in an interesting light as it personifies the website and it's staff through a massive but empty office as they communicate through the internet. The use of the office is incredibly clever as communicating through chat rooms and through server domains can be boring. The idea of creating an office to personify and create to the idea of interface through the internet was one of my favourite ideas because it brings another element to the movie, rather than a few people sitting around a computer typing into a chatroom for the entireity of the movie. The other element added to the movie was the American security element. Another way to create a more interesting picture throughout the film. It shows the security risk the documents leaked had on people's lives. Both if they were in the documents and not. This side story seemed slightly pointless to me Dad but I thought it added some nice context to the movie. Although the pace of the movie disappointed me, it seemed to move incredibly slowly until the very end where the action actually began to happen as the launch of the leak was near. As the book was the main source for the movie this doesn't surprise me however it did dampen the movie. That said, I still very much enjoyed this film and recommend it to anybody who is interested in Wikileaks and the almost prologue to the Wikileaks and Julian Assange that have made the headlines in the past few years.