Citizenfour - The Edward Snowden Story

Citizenfour - An important movie IMO, a chilling film that should scare everybody. This is a fascinating story of a high character guy with a ton of balls and everything to lose. Ultimately an over-hyped, underutilized and disappointing piece of documentary film-making. I know this is getting raves everywhere, and I think it has more to do with the importance of the subject matter, then the actual film on display.

The story of Edward Snowden. NSA whistleblower and present day wanted man and American exile. Many call him a traiter, many more call him a hero. It's not hyperbolic, like a Michael Moore documentary might be, but it's not completely immersive as it could have been, especially considering the access they had to Snowden, during the unfolding of his story. It's a fairly sterile piece of film-making, considering the stakes involved, if I'm to be completely honest. I wished they would have tugged at my heartstrings and my sense of the injustice of it all, just a little bit more.

I understand the film-makers and the journalists involved were under a lot of pressure from the government themselves and that may have affected the final product, and they may have thought a straight point A, to point B, to point C, telling of the story would be more credible for their cause. I just feel the way it's presented will do little to curb the apathy most feel about the matter at hand.

Good film, could have been better.

7/10

 

Noble, will you watch the Oliver Stone movie about Snowden? I'm not a huge fan of him but his films tend to stir up the mainstream.

 

I like Stone more then most will admit nowadays, but I'd rather it ended up in the hands of Greengrass, Bigelow or Michael Mann.

 

I haven't seen it yet but that was one my worries as well.

 

I didnt really follow the story through the news, so didnt know what to expect from this doco, but this was my biggest take away.

The last 20 minutes of this were probably the best.