The Crooked E: The Unshredded Truth About Enron

The Crooked E, The Unshredded Truth About Enron, was based on the true story of an Enron employee, Brian Cruver, the ink hardly dry on his MBA when he came to work for the self-proclaimed "greatest company in the world." He starts out as a wide-eyed innocent and soon becomes seduced by "the dark side of the force," becoming arrogant, deceptive, and greedy, buying a Lexus convertible, a $700 raincoat, and planning a $60,000 wedding, much to the dismay of his down-to-earth fiancee, who eventually leaves him. But as he begins to realize just what is happening there, he quickly becomes disillusioned and, by the time the company has gone belly-up, he has regained his integrity (to the point of destroying a contract that would have badly hurt the client) and his fiancee. This, incidentally, is a departure from the book, as Cruver marries about two months into his short stay at Enron.

Christian Kane has the momentous job of playing Cruver, as he appears in every scene except for a prologue which shows him as a child with "Mr. Blue," Brian Dennehey. He also does the narration and has a brief song while driving his new Lexus. And he does it all with dash and aplomb. If this very handsome, talented young actor, whom the camera loves, is not a superstar in the next couple of years, there is something radically wrong. Tony winner Dennehey is outstanding as an employee with a sad story to tell, and Mike Farrell presents Ken Lay as either an eternal optimist or a bald-faced liar or some of both.

I hope this will eventually come out on video or DVD as it's a keeper.

Thought this film was reasonable,it gave me a better understanding of what really happened....and i would suggest to anyone who is not clear as to the reason for Enrons demise,that they watch this film and get wise. I will be buying Brian Cruver's book as i think he should at least make a little cash out of all this!

A few minutes ago I submitted a review of this television movie and one thing I said was I didn't know whether the main character ever really existed or not. Then I read some of the other reviews and saw he did-that this was based on a true story of one of the Enron employees. I'm glad to know the main character wasn't fictionized so that definetly brings the movie up a point or 2 but I still wish they'd gone into more character depth with some of the other Enron employees.

It's not really a story about Enron so much as about one person who got a job at Enron for the final few months before the company went under.

I knew someone who worked at Enron. She started out as a secretary but was very happy to have worked her way into the banking and investment side of the company. That was about a year before the company collapsed and I'd lost touch with her, but I've often wondered how she ended up. If she landed on her feet. I never knew her well, don't have her contact info.

There are probably a thousand stories about individual employees at Enron and how this changed things for them. It's hard to feel sorry for the individuals, when the investors were the real victims, but employees have stories too.

This made for TV movie, which I saw when it came out, was barely adequate. I made it through, but I didn't find it impressive. The Smartest Men in the Room is a far better and much more complete story about Enron.

Having had ambitions since a being young man, Brian Cruver is fired up when he gets a desk at Enron – one the largest companies in America. After taking a bit of time to come to terms with the approach and working style of the place, Cruver quickly settles in and makes a name for himself with some big deals, perhaps being helped a bit by knowing Mr Blue, one of the top men in the company.

With Kenneth Lay dead mere months after being found guilty, the Natwest Three becoming a major political football in UK/US relations and one of the bankers found dead six days after going missing, my interest in the subject was peaked enough to look back on this film from a few years ago. The downside of my timing was that I had already seen the imperfect but vastly superior Smartest Guy in the Room. As a documentary, this other film focuses on developing the main story and presenting it as clearly as possible. It also benefits hugely from having access to the in-house video footage that this film can only dramatise. Conversely this film takes a dramatisation path that means by default it has to focus on the made-up character of Cruver and his story as much as on the story of Enron. To some viewers this will work but I suggest that these people have not seen Smartest Guys.

This film does a so-so job of explaining the story but it is happy to do it in massive jumps and simplifications that don't give you the time to let them sink in more than you need to keep Cruver's story moving forward. It delivers the impact of the story pretty basically as well – having women crying about their lost money etc. The focus on Cruver doesn't really work because you can't shake the feeling (the knowledge) that his story is infinitely less interesting than the wider story of the corporation and its impact on business. It is made weaker by the TVM style delivery which works "best" overdoing the soapy emotion of the tale but cannot cope with the complex case and the wider ramifications. The direction is so-so and the budget limited – although in fairness Smartest Guys used the real offices and real footage, so this can't compare.

The cast are roundly weak, which isn't that much of a surprise. Kane is bland and never convinces no matter what his character is going through. Sure his material isn't that good but his performance is no better. Elizabeth is a "big name" in this film and to the vast majority of us alarm bells will be ringing – she has little to do either way. Dennehy turns in with a poor character that is used to explain things in the place of a decent script and his lack of interest is writ large across his performance. The rest of the cast are so-so at best but few convince and Farrell and Wynne are particularly weak.

Overall this is an entry-level film if you are looking to learn more about power, corporations – much better is Smartest Guys. In the absence of that film this might be worth a look but it is hard to get a lot of value from this very soapy approach. Works as daytime fodder but the truth deserves much, much more than this.