Snowden

Fantastic acting makes Oliver Stone’s latest excursion into politics a riveting 2 1/2 hours.

Snowden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Shailene Woodley, Rhys Ifans, Melissa Leo, Tom Wilkinson, Zachary Quinto, Nicolas Cage) – It is uncanny how much Joseph Gordon-Levitt looks and sounds like Edward Snowden.  It isn’t just the look; JGL manages to capture Snowden’s walk, cadence, and demeanor in this Oliver Stone version of the story of the leaker/hacker who became the poster child for whistle blowing and government eavesdropping.

 

Snowden is quintessentially Stone, who never hides his own point of view.  The director of JFK, Nixon, Wall Street, Platoon, Any Given Sunday and many other controversial films, Stone claims to have turned down this movie when it was first presented because it is politically charged.  But regardless of how you feel about what Snowden did, you must admit that the then-29-year-old’s revelations about government surveillance on U.S. citizens and international leaders sparked a national debate about security vs. freedom vs. privacy.

 

Stone does an outstanding job of giving us the Snowden back-story, telling us about the kid’s evolution from soldier to CIA and NSA cyber-expert to government cyber-security contractor.  He fills the screen with interesting characters, most notably Snowden’s teacher/sponsor, Corbin O’Brien (Rhys Ifans), and his girlfriend, Lindsay Mills (Shailene Woodley).  The performances of the “B-list” supporting cast are fantastic.  In addition to Ifans (Notting Hill) and Woodley (The Descendants, Divergent), Melissa Leo (Oscar winner for The Fighter) as documentarian Laura Poitras; Zachary Quinto (Dr. Spock from the new Star Trek films) as journalist Glenn Greenwald; and Tom Wilkinson (twice nominated for In The Bedroom and Michael Clayton) as Scottish journalist Ewen MacAskill stand out.

 

But the movie hinges on Gordon-Levitt’s exceptional performance as Snowden.  Fortunately for him, he had great source material, including Poitras’ 2014 documentary, Citizenfour, a film I strongly recommended.  Stone chooses to start the movie in Snowden’s hotel room in Hong Kong as he hands over his classified information to Poitras and Greenwald.  He then flashes back to Snowden’s life.  This technique isn’t new but it is very revealing and gives context (albeit biased) to Snowden’s actions.

 

Snowden will be controversial.  Stone just couldn’t resist making Snowden a patriotic and sympathetic figure (as Citizenfour does) even as we all know that he clearly violated the law.  And when Snowden himself is featured from Russia at the end of the film, he appears to be self-satisfied, not repentant. 

 

Whether you view the film as propaganda or a fully rounded view of the accused spy probably depends on your political view.  But there is no doubt that Snowden is a fine film and an effective accompaniment to Citizenfour.  That made it must viewing for me and, I hope, for you.

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