Based on the article The Man Who Knew Too Much, THE INSIDER depicts the true story of Jeffrey Wigand (Russell Crowe), a successful scientist who is fired from the Brown & Williamson tobacco company for objecting to certain lab tests. He signs a confidentiality agreement to ease the company's nervousness, but when hotshot 60 MINUTES producer Lowell Bergman (Al Pacino) recruits Wigand to help him decipher some technical documents, he realizes that there's a bigger story hiding inside Wigand. Eventually Bergman convinces him to break the agreement and sit for an interview with Mike Wallace (Christopher Plummer). The resulting media frenzy causes Wigand to lose the support of his family and forces Bergman to confront the harsh reality of his business. Additionally, Wigand is recruited by the state of Mississippi to testify on its behalf that cigarettes are, in fact, addictive. To pay the rent, he begins teaching high school chemistry, waiting for Bergman to convince the network to air the piece. Buckling under corporate pressure, CBS pulls the plug, which sparks Bergman to leak information to the press. As Wigand deals with his personal dilemma, Bergman battles the corporation that begins to show its true colors. Both men must decide for themselves if they've made the right choices.
Like his other films THIEF, MANHUNTER, and HEAT, director Michael Mann takes on the theme of a man trying to do the right thing while trapped by circumstances that could destroy him. Once again Mann pulls terrific performances from his entire cast. Crowe is outstanding as Jeff Wigand, the beleaguered insider who risks everything for the truth. Pacino is suitably tenacious as the once-radical producer Bergman, and Christopher Plummer is excellent as news anchor Mike Wallace. With its brilliant performances and stunning cinematography, THE INSIDER is an emotionally intense film that reveals the consequences of standing up for the truth.
Big Tobacco comes under the spotlight in this virtuoso ethical drama directed by Michael Mann, based on the true case of a whistle-blower whose life was ruined when he decided to tell all to 60 Minutes. Russell Crowe plays Jeffrey Wigand, the sacked executive who went public with his firm's dark secrets, only to find his interview canned by network heads terrified of a potentially catastrophic law suit. Al Pacino sears the screen as Lowell Bergman, the producer who broke the story, while Christopher Plummer is superb as anchorman Mike Wallace. True, Mann has little interest in his female characters — Diane Venora is criminally underused as Wigand's wife Liane — but if you're searching for signs of intelligent life in Hollywood, look no further than this dazzling exposé of money, morals and the media.
Halliwell's Film Guide
A true-life, devastating exposé of the way corporations and the media respond to unwelcome facts, and a gripping drama of an ordinary, principled man caught up in events beyond his control; if the film has a fault, it is that it is too long.
New York Times
"...Mr. Mann has directed THE INSIDER with a pulse-quickening panache that heightens the tension within its story....There are stunningly evocative images here..."
Radio Times
Halliwell's Film Guide
