‘The Insider’ At 25: Corporate America Vs. The Truth
On Michael Mann’s 1999 drama about whistleblowing, a reporter’s duty to his source, and the news media business
One of the few films to truly capture the struggle and trauma that a whistleblower experiences is Michael Mann’s “The Insider.” It also is a painstaking examination of the news media business, with more in common with “Network” than “All The President’s Men” — both released in 1976.
Based upon a Vanity Fair feature by journalist Marie Brenner published in May 1996, The Insider was released in the United States on November 5, 1999. The film told the story of a tobacco company whistleblower named Jeffrey Wigand, “60 Minutes” producer Lowell Bergman, and the corporate suppression that they faced as CBS executives refused to air a bombshell interview with Wigand.
It was nominated for seven Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay), Best Cinematography, Best Film Editing, and Best Sound, and the film stars Al Pacino as Bergman and Russell Crowe as Wigand.
The supporting cast included Christopher Plummer as renowned journalist Mike Wallace, Philip Baker Hall as Don Hewitt, a CBS executive who created “60 Minutes,” Diane Venora as Jeffrey’s wife Liane, and Michael Gambon as Thomas Sandefur, who was the CEO of Brown & Williamson. Bruce McGill, who plays trial attorney Ron Motley, left an indelible mark in one particular courtroom scene.
Screenwriter Eric Roth, who more recently co-wrote the scripts for Dune: Part One (2021) and Killers of the Flower Moon (2023), thoroughly researched events in The Insider. Roth demonstrated how adept he is at weaving many threads of a complex story without the 2 hour and 37 minute film becoming a stodgy mess.
The Insider achieved some notoriety due to how much Wallace despised the film. It depicted him as a celebrity correspondent, who had done little to fight for the interview, when the truth that Wigand had to share was deemed a threat to the corporate interests of CBS.
Mann had offered Wallace an opportunity to star in the movie as himself, but he walked away from the offer. Roth told Vulture, “Mike Wallace used to call and scream at me. What, you believe this fucking Lowell Bergman? He would say all sorts of things, and I’d write it down and we’d put it in the script.” Wallace also called Mann, and Mann recorded one phone call and used part of it for the film.
But 25 years later, The Insider’s real legacy is not simply that Wallace hated the movie. Rather its legacy is that it introduced an audience to a whistleblower who deserved to be a household name while confronting the corrosive impact of media consolidation on journalism.
Read the full article at Counter Arts.
Thank You Kevin