The Informant!

Disappointing effort from Soderbergh, especially since, given the source material, it had a lot of potential. The story and script are solid - the plot twists and turns and often takes the viewer by surprise, and manages to slip in a statement about the incompetency of both government officials and business companies. And yet, it doesn't really hit a nerve, mainly because of hollow and dull directing. Damon does a decent job but his character - filled to the brim with quirks and personality traits - doesn't really have any actual personality, nor does any other character in the entire film. And stylistically it's a total mess. The title cards and goofy music are supposed to tell us that we're in a homage to 60's spy movies but mainly they just irritate, especially the terrible musical score that's plastered onto every scene in an effort to prove that, despite being everything but, The Informant is actually a comedy. It doesn't work. It's watchable but it's also a real waste, a good story fallen victim to poor storytelling.

Reading the opinions posted on this site it appears that a lot of viewers came to this film with the expectation of big laughs throughout and, when the film didn't delivered them, walked off in a huff moaning about the film failing to deliver. In fairness to them I suspect that their complaints may be valid based on trailers and marketing suggesting this would be the case – the exclamation point in the title probably didn't help either. So I'm glad then that I came to the film without a great deal of knowledge about what the film was trying to be other than it was a slightly comic version of a true case from the 1990's.

I am glad because this is what the film is – a comic take on a real situation where the decision to do so as a light comedy appears to have paid off. With Mark Whitacre as the main character, we follow him into the case and we immediately start to get the impression that this guy really doesn't have his head in the real world – like he doesn't understand the consequences of anything he says and does, which perhaps accounts for his rather cheerful outlook and easy personality. This is true but the full extent of his actions are unveiled nicely across the whole film – leaving me at times a little like the FBI lawyer during the presentation from ADM's attorney, mouth open not quite believing it.

It is not a hilarious movie by any means but the comic air makes it easy to enjoy and the story is engaging and entertaining. Soderbergh does slightly overdo the "wacky" feel to and he probably didn't need to have as many recognisable faces from comedy in small roles, but he does make it work. A big part of this reason is Matt Damon – showing that while he may be a Hollywood action star now, he is very capable as a character actor to. He does channel William H Macy from Fargo a little bit in how he will try and make pathetic lies to get himself out of trouble but I see this as a compliment because Macy is very good at that sort of character performance. Damon nails the cheerful self-delusion and his narration keeps us "on side" with him, making the comic tone work. The support cast is perhaps a bit too full of well-known faces but everyone is good, working again with the approach.

Overall The Informant! appears to be disliked mainly by those who expected something that marketing led them to believe this was. Coming to it on its own terms however this is an engaging story told with a comic air that works and makes the film as entertaining as it is interesting. Not hilarious and one could question if it is fair to handle Whitacre's story in a light manner, but it does work and I enjoyed it for what it was.

I suppose I will always find something to like in a Soderbergh movie. The real joy is in never knowing just what that will be. Even in his most mainstream projects he is exploring some new skill. Here it is the notion of narration.

I'll have to see this a second time with a DVD stop button to be able to fully catalog all the various modes that our filmmaker skips seamlessly through. The main device he weaves these modes around is the spine of the untrusted narrator. We have all sorts of layers and nodes of deception with the only ones we can really trust being the guys usually are the bottom of the garbage bin: the massive greedy company.

We have this fellow being dishonest to everyone, including himself. We have no idea where the line is that he actually believes and we hear only from him. Some of the internal dialog is hypnotizing: we are lulled into accepting it because so much of it is appealingly funny. It is a great trick of misdirection, allowing us to associate with this slippery reality.

Folded into this is are the watchers, nominally the FBI, then various lawyers and the wife, but us of course, punctuated by a video at the end directly to us (with the FBI behind a mirror).

A second surprise awaited me beyond the Soderbergh stretching. Matt Damon finally does something impressive. He is truly something worth watching here. I never would have guessed. I never would have believed. In fact, this wouldn't have worked at all, this suspended belief within the story, if he had not so believably become the character.

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

Greetings again from the darkness. Steven Soderbergh is a genius with a camera. Just admiring the shots, angles and movement of the camera in his films is worth the price of admission. Here we get a fact-based story from the book by Kurt Eichenwald showing us what happened when Mark Whitacre became one of the most famous corporate whistle-blowers of all time ... he exposed price-fixing at Archer Daniels Midland, the ag-giant.

Matt Damon takes this quasi-caricature and turns him into a comedy act along the lines of Jim Carrey in Liar, Liar. OK, I'll admit, there is more subtlety here than in that one. Still, the voice-overs by Damon's character provide the ramblings of a madman - an ADD, embezzling madman.

There is so much comedy here that it is easy to forget what heinous crimes the senior management of this company actually committed - and how arrogant to think they could get away with it. This again shows that many in the corporate world are the equals of even the most corrupt politicians. Power and Greed are all-consuming.

While, I don't know the details of the real story, it was interesting to watch Whitacre's interacting/playing with the FBI agents (Scott Bacula and Joel McHale). They want to believe him and are actually crushed when his game is exposed.

A real Soderbergh touch is the casting of both Smothers Brothers in unrelated roles. Very nice. It is very difficult for me to believe that someone as intelligent and shrewd as Whitacre could actually be so, well, goofy. But it does add an entertainment element to the film. I will say it is not at the level of far superior "The Insider" or even "Catch Me if You Can", but it is quite watchable.

Layers, more layers, it goes on and on when corporate informer Mark Whitacre (Matt Damon) starts blabbing to the FBI about dodgy shenanigans at his mid-west corn-producing employers. Who do we believe? Where are the truths? Things are not a simple as they may initially seem. This is a quirky production, y'know the type, kinda colourful in a cartoon postcard kind of way with an optimistic voiceover from our main character. It is not one of those heavy, heavy expose's investigating the workings of huge corporations with tense court scenes and the like. No, the touch is certainly kept light and the subject-matter all the more interesting because it focuses in on the individual rather than the faceless corporate edifice. Not laugh-out-loud despite being described as a comedy, but reasonably entertaining and worth checking out.