Bill Condon’s “The Fifth Estate” presents WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange — well played by Benedict Cumberbatch, who has the film’s best (and perhaps only) shot at an Oscar nomination — basically as a smellier, even more ruthless version of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Making its world premiere as the opening night film at the Toronto International Film Festival on Thursday, “The FIfth Estate” is based partly on a memoir by former Assange lieutenant Daniel Domscheit-Berg (Daniel Bruhl), who the film paints as pretty much as the equivalent of the long-suffering, more conscience-driven Eduardo Saverin in the far more compelling “The Social Network,” a film “The Fifth Estate” unwisely emulates, as WikiLeaks is no Facebook in terms of its impact on the public.
The doggedly loyal Domsheit-Berg brushes aside Assange’s arrogant grandstanding, lies, paranoia and refusal to share any credit. He finally breaks with Assange after the latter goes back on an agreement to redact names of intelligence sources in thousands of confidential government documents about the war in Afghanistan that WikiLeaks published in coordination with the New York Times and other old-school media Assange had such contempt for, because it was good publicity for WikiLeaks. (The Times’ culpability in giving Assange credibility is pretty much glossed over as Condon focuses primarily on England’s The Guardian, represented by a veteran reporter played by an excellent David Thewlis).
Unfortunately for Condon, he barely mentions the figure who has emerged as the most fascinating character in WikiLeaks’ most famous caper — Bradley Manning, the soldier who leaked the documents and who came out as as a transsexual just before his recent sentencing.
Instead, the main, less-than-fascinating subplot focuses on composite U.S. State Department officials (played by Laura Linney) attempting damage control, including protecting a longtime covert operative (Alexander Siddig) in the Middle East.
“The FIfth Estate,” which hits U.S. theaters on Oct. 18, is quite watchable, using graphics and special effects in novel ways to break up the tedium of yet another film with way too many computer screens. But its depiction of the rise of “citizen journalism” — and Assange’s hypocritical double standard when it comes to over-hyping his revelations — is much less incisive than I wanted it to be. And the Swedish rape allegations against Assange that prompted him to take asylum in Ecuador’s British embassy are reduced to an on-screen crawl at the end.