The Informant!

< Previous Trailer  |   Add to My Scrapbook  |   Next Trailer >
The Informant!

47% Liked It
liked it

The Informant!

Matt Damon, Scott Bakula, Joel McHale, Melanie Lynskey, Rick Overton

What was Mark Whitacre thinking? A rising star at agri-industry giant Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Whitacre suddenly turns whistleblower. Even as he exposes his company’s multi-national price-fixing ...( read more  read more... )conspiracy to the FBI, Whitacre envisions himself being hailed as a hero of the common man and handed a promotion. But before all that can happen, the FBI needs evidence, so Whitacre eagerly agrees to wear a wire and carry a hidden tape recorder in his briefcase, imagining himself as a kind of de facto secret agent. Unfortunately for the FBI, their lead witness hasn’t been quite so forthcoming about helping himself to the corporate coffers. Whitacre’s ever-changing account frustrates the agents and threatens the case against ADM as it becomes almost impossible to decipher what is real and what is the product of Whitacre’s rambling imagination. Based on the true story of the highest-ranking corporate whistleblower in U.S. history.

Id: 11037296

Do you want to see this movie?

My Friends Said...

The Informant! Recent Reviews

Register or sign-in to see your friends' reviews !

Recent Reviews

The Informant! Recent Reviews
  • barrys
    November 23, 2009
    barrys
    The informant is that kind of movie that at the end of the movie you go out thinking and wondering what you saw. But after certain time you realize that you saw and intelligent , very sarcastic and incredible movie. It is a film about ising corporate star, Mark Whitacre, who turn...( read more)s whistleblower against his employer, agribusiness giant ADM, for price fixing. Its story is very good and the plot is very well developed. The movie at the beginning is a little slow and maybe tiresome but the last hour when the situations began to unwrap, it becomes very interesting and with a very fast pace. The music is really enjoyable The cast is very good, a very fat Matt Damon in a type of role you never imagine him to be, Melanie Lynskey as Damon's wife was quite decent and after being away fro I don't know how much time, Scott Bakula with and excellent peformance. In conclusion, Steven Soderbergh latest movie is a very interesting movie people should give it a chance, it totally worth it.
  • her69eyes
    October 28, 2009
    her69eyes
    Steven Soderbergh's third effort to be released in the last 12 months (fourth if you count "Che" as two pictures) is "The Informant!", a comic corporate thriller about real-life whistle-blower Mark Whitacre. Whitacre, who suffered from bipolar disorder, became notorious as being ...( read more)the highest-ranking executive in U.S. history to snitch in a case of corporate fraud. In the end, Whitacre succeeded in revealing Archer Daniels Midland's price-fixing tactics, but meanwhile wound up with a prison sentence three times longer than the criminal executives he successfully exposed.

    Matt Damon, who gained thirty pounds for the role, dons an ugly toupee and a mustache for the task of playing Whitacre. He's not your typical hero - he never quite tells the whole truth, he often blatantly lies, and he displays the intellect of a 9-year-old with severe attention deficit disorder in the process. Through inner monologue, Damon's Whitacre often indulges his wealth of useless trivia while receiving briefing by the FBI - facts about polar bears, butterflies, and the panties of young girls in Japanese vending machines.

    Whitacre becomes involved with special agent Brian Shepard (Scott Bakula) after revealing a huge price-fixing scheme on lysine, an amino acid, concocted by agribusiness giant ADM. For two and a half years, Whitacre wears a wire, providing hundreds of tapes for the ongoing investigation. In the process, however, Whitacre's ignorance jeopardizes the entire case - he narrates his tapes, introducing everyone he encounters by name and job title, and even starts fiddling with his Nagra device during a business meeting with the executives he's in the process of exposing.

    Soderbergh doesn't let us too close to Whitacre - we share the frustrations of the FBI agents and lawyers trying to get a straight story out of him. While a lesser actor might make such a character frustrating, however, Damon has such an abundance of charisma that he's pleasant company throughout. We may groan when, later in the film, Whitacre attempts completely asinine counter-lawsuits against both ADM and the FBI, but no matter how deep he digs himself into a hole, we're always pulling for him. Whitacre, often saying that the conspiracy is like "something out of a Crichton novel", pegs himself to be a super-spy - 0014, in fact, as he's twice as smart as 007.

    Damon will probably be an oversight come Oscar season, but it may be one of the actor's very best performances. The supporting cast is all wonderful, as well, from Melanie Lynskey as Whitacre's wife to the terrifically deadpan Scott Bakula. "The Informant!" is yet another film in Soderbergh's repertoire that solidifies him as one of the most interesting, and certainly one of the most diverse, American directors working today.
  • hypathio7
    September 28, 2009
    hypathio7
    The trailer is misleading in portraying Damon's character as a bumbling informant who yearns to be a secret agent. The poster suggests Apatow's dopey, innocent 40 Year Old Virgin poster. But the fact that these things mislead fits the story. Damon is mesmerizing in this very d...( read more)ifferent role. This man, Mark Whitacre, with a little extra weight, a mustache, big glasses, and a hairpiece (all things that obscure his identity) is NOT so innocent. He does claim to see himself as the white hatted cowboy against a posse of black hatted villains, as someone twice as smart as James Bond- 0014, and as Tom Cruise in The Firm. Well, he has a lot of delusions. The humor is derived from his cryptic voice over observations about life and all his scheming, while everyone else except his wife struggles to discover the truth. It's about what it means to live a double life and how spinning story after story to cover for previous stories can get one in trouble. There are a ton of enjoyable cameos and supporting performances. The music is Henry Mancini-esque.
  • sanjurosamurai
    September 27, 2009
    sanjurosamurai
    a very pleasant surprise. i liked this film a lot, and it wouldnt be a stretch to say that its probably the best of all of the soderbergh films ive seen. matt damon was great and the script was perfectly witty and clever. i find soderbergh to be an inconsistent director, but s...( read more)ome of the choices he made here to let things happen off camera helped to set up the mystery of who was lying and who was telling the truth and it made this dramedy extremely effective. highly recommended.
  • DrZeek
    September 21, 2009
    DrZeek
    Mark Whitacre; I haven't been telling you guys the whole truth, but I'm gonna clear that up in here today.

    Matt Damon and director Steven Soderbergh team up without the rest of the Ocean's gang to make a corporate thriller. However, instead of treating it like Michael Mann's T...( read more)he Insider, the film reverses what could be seen as tension and makes the film into a human comedy.

    Damon stars as Mark Whitacre, a rising biochemist put into the business side of his company. However, after discovering a few things that seem to not be good morally, Whitacre goes to the FBI to turn whistle blower against his company. What follows is a story that places Whitacre in the line of fire as he works a double life involving him taping business meetings and reporting on instances of illegal activities, however there may be more to Whitacre's innocent nature than it seems.

    While being sold as a more outrageous comedy in its trailers, true to Soderbergh's style as a director, the film plays more slowly and subtly in terms of its story and characters. This can't be said for its score by "The Stings" Melvin Hamlish, who gives the film a 60s jazzy tone, undercutting any possible seriousness for the film.

    There is a large cast of character actors, mostly comedians, featured in this film and it all felt fitting to the tone of the picture, however it is Damon who makes this film work. Between the witty narration of obscure thoughts and the fun he has with gaining weight and making himself appear ridiculous, he has this character down and helps this film along.

    Soderbergh once again amuses me with his ability to jump back and forth between bigger and smaller pictures within a short time frame. Each time, his films have a great aesthetic quality to them, making the films appear to be carefully planned out, with a good looking quality to them.

    I point this out because there isn't much to this film and it wont appeal to everyone, but Damon is great in it and fans of Soderbergh should like it.

    Mark Whitacre: Why would I hid anything from you guys?
  • alexbasketball
    December 29, 2009
    alexbasketball
    not sure if the fact i watched this on a plane affected my judgment, but i really couldnt get into it. it seemed very repetative throughout with damons character lying, lying, lying and i just got bored after a while. damon does play the role well and diserves credit for the role...( read more), but it just wasnt enough to entetain.
  • suckfail
    December 23, 2009
    suckfail
    this movie was delightful. i mean, that word is usually used with some sort of strawberry cake. something like, ?that strawberry cake was delightful. i wish i could eat it everyday. oh wait i can because i?m a princess.? just like that. but this movie isn?t cake, and has no straw...( read more)berries in it that i know of.

    so where does the delight come from? it mostly comes from matt damon?s head. every now and then the movie will kind of dim out, and you?ll hear his thoughts. and how delicious they are! now you know why it?s delightful.

    if it wasn?t for these clever little devices in the film, making it more intriguing, i would have been bored. i don?t feel bad saying that, there wasn?t any action, sex, guns, or kittens. no, it was just filled with middle aged business men, the type which nobody cares about. you see them everyday anyways, cleaning cars, doing your taxes, being your father. the plot wasn?t terrible, it just wasn?t captivating either. picture two women next to each other. one is absolutely beautiful, the other is average. the beautiful one is only there for a few minutes every hour, but the average one is always around. which one are you going to stare at? that?s what matt damon?s head is; the beautiful woman.

    i rate this movie 5.4/7. i wish they had of explained a few things with more depth, especially at the end, but i still liked it. it was better than i expected, which doesn?t say much because i had no idea what it was about before i watched it. absolutely none. all i knew was that matt damon was in it, and it may or may not involve an informant. who that informant is, what they may or may not be informing of, i did not know. but now i do, and it was tasty. i?m hungry.

    http://suckfail.wordpress.com/2009/10/29/the-informant/
  • azizjapanwalla
    December 13, 2009
    azizjapanwalla
    The trailer and storyline looks good. Wanna see it for sure.
  • JakeStevensMusic
    December 13, 2009
    JakeStevensMusic
    There's been a small resurgence as of late in 70's-style filmmaking thanks to directors such as Steven Soderbergh and Tony Gilroy; films where greater rewards are reaped through slow, deliberate pacing and emphasis is placed on character development and thickening plots; and I co...( read more)uldn't be more happy about this fact.

    "The Informant!" is one such film, where Matt Damon's "Mark Whitacre" character finds himself getting buried under lie upon lie...or are they? The slightly ambiguous tone of the film keeps you guessing until the end, and that, of course, is a huge nod to the fine acting from all parties concerned. If you like your cinema with that 70's vibe, this will definitely be up your alley - not for the Michael Bay-ADD crowd, to be sure.
  • ahs15
    December 13, 2009
    ahs15
    Watch This Movie Online FREE
    http://Fly75.com
View All Reviews

Opening This Week

Top Box Office

Upcoming Movies

New on DVD