The Insider

December 11, 2004

Rated: R Runtime: 157 min Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

DVD QuickTake

I really liked this movie. In fact, I liked it enough to raise its star rating for DVD to 4 from the original 3 stars it receive during its theatrical run. Yes, it’s a tad too long, but it did hold my interest for the entire 2 hours and 37 minutes.

No complaints about the DVD itself either. The picture was great, the audio was dandy, and the making of feature was pretty interesting.

- John

Movies For Guys’ Original Review of the Theatrical Release

As I was walking out of the theater from watching “The Insider” movie, I overheard the couple in front of me discussing her father’s diabetes and how it was starting to affect his eyesight. I dunno, maybe they were trying to lighten the mood a bit after have just sat through this intensely serious and cynical movie.

Going into it, I knew the movie was based on the true story of Jeffrey Wigand, an ex-tobacco company exec, who, with the help of “60 Minutes” producer Lowell Bergman, tried to blow the whistle on the dirty dealings of his former employer. I also felt it would be somewhat of a chick-flick so, with all this in mind, I wasn’t expecting much. What I got, however, was a movie that was a cut above most of those of its same type.

Indeed, the story was predictable and, yes, it was a bit of a chick-flick, but the movie keeps your interest by focusing not on the “evil tobacco company” and its attempt to keep the lid on the dirty laundry, but on Wigand and Bergman. The movie shows what often happens to men (and their careers and families) who try to do the right thing.

Bergman believes this is a story that needs to be told and Wigand wants to tell it. Ultimately, however, both the tobacco company and CBS try to suppress the story and that’s when the corporate politics and mudslinging really gets going. Of course, this is when Pacino gets going, too. Al is best when he can rant about something on the big screen, and he’s got plenty to rant about here!

About the only complaint I have with the movie is that it suffers from a somewhat slow pace. At just over 2.5 hours, it drags in a couple of places where some prudent editing should have been done. If they had trimmed this down to 2 hours, it would certainly be a better movie, but even still, it ain’t half bad.

Even though the scores to the right of this review are quite low, don’t let that fool you. Yes, to a certain extent this movie could be called a chick-flick, but if your ol’ lady is going to drag you to a movie this weekend, you could do worse than this movie - a lot worse.

Posted by Alex | Filed Under 4 Stars, Al Pacino, Christopher Plummer, DVD, Drama, R, Russell Crowe