Steven Soderbergh’s latest is a unique picture that spins a pretty serious and messed up character study into a comedy by applying a silly tone and ramping up the absurdity that this actually happened and the results are pretty good for the most part.
Mark Whitacre is a bit out of his element. He is a PHD in biochemistry but was promoted to an executive level at his company ADM and quickly became a valuable asset to the company and began making large sums of money in his new role. One day he receives a phone call from an employee from a rival Japanese company that claims they have a mole in ADM’s midst and he is sabotaging their lysine production and that he needs ten million dollars to make this problem all go away. When the FBI is brought in to assist with the embezzlement proceedings, Whitacre begins to get nervous and he decides to turn informant on his own company as he is afraid that the FBI will uncover the company’s price fixing frauds. From here, the film dives into Whitacre’s exploits as an informant as the story around the man slowly gets weirder and weirder. [Read more...]