The Informant! – based on the true story of an American corporate whistle-blower with a fab talent for fabulation – is a very entertaining and densely layered comedy for grown-ups with attention spans.
Speaking of densely layered, Matt Damon, in his fifth outing with director Steven Soderbergh, put on 30 pounds to play Mark Whitacre, an industrial biochemist with solid scientific credentials and an absolutely stellar ability to lead other professionals on a merry chase. The weight makes Damon seem cuddly and harmless, sort of like Winnie the Pooh were he to convince the FBI that there was rampant price-fixing in the honey field.
The action starts in humdrum Decatur, Illinois in October of 1992 and covers genuine events up until 2006. The production shot in many of the actual locations, including the real Whitacre's former home. Versimilitude in production design is just one of the fine-tuned delights of a tale that feeds into our suspicions that big business can't be trusted and it takes a certain brand of cocky bravery to expose the bad guys.
Whitacre is bland as can be on the surface and a bubbling cauldron of pop culture speculation and brand-name fantasising inside. We are privy to his near-constant internal monologue, which is a subtitler's nightmare and a native-speaker-of-English's delight. Whitacre is the only air traffic controller with a handle on his flights of fancy. As viewers, we keep expecting his improvisatory flight path to collide with reality but he's a deluded daredevil of deceit in the lumpy body and unfortunate hairdo of a selfless do-gooder.
Whitacre is the sort of fellow who implements time management by flossing his teeth in the shower while waiting for his hair conditioner to penetrate. He muses that polar bears match their snowy surroundings except for the black noses they have to cover with their paws in order to fool fish into surfacing. In situations where mere mortals would be sweating bullets, Whitacre is relaxed. His dorky confidence works in his favour.
Whitacre has told the FBI that he knows there is criminal price-fixing afoot in the lysine business and Japan is a major guilty party. This is surely one of the best movies ever to spin a lively chronicle of trust and second-guessing from purported manipulation of a basic amino acid.
Gleefully wearing a wire in order to gather evidence to back his claims of unfair practices in international agricultural circles, Whitacre is as discreet as a live hand grenade in a bowl of fruit salad. He brags about being agent 0014 because he believes himself to be "twice as smart as James Bond."
And who can blame him? Genuine FBI agents find themselves both shaken and stirred.
In light of the wholesome, church-going family man's allegations, hard working FBI agent Brian Shepherd (Scott Bakula) holds the view that, "Everybody in this country is a victim of corporate crime before he gets to breakfast." Any number of characters end up having to eat their words, with tasty results for the audience.
In early September 2009, Soderbergh told the press at France's American Film Festival in Deauville that, "As an American director, my happy place is a movie being made between 1966 and 1976." Although the events depicted in The Informant! actually took place in the 1990s, the director has given his movie a wonderful sixties-inflected score by Marvin Hamlisch. There may as well be flashing signs inviting viewers to grin.
Damon is effortlessly comic, playing a brilliant liar who's somehow too dumb to grasp that people doing illegal stuff don't usually reward the folks who draw attention to their heretofore undiscovered misdeeds. The supporting cast is made up of actors who melt into their roles, making the incredible true tale that much more believable. "We wanted to avoid the kind of casting where you're taken out of the story by saying to yourself 'Oh, look, that's so-and-so,'" Soderbergh says.
New Zealander Melanie Lynskey is adoringly supportive as Mark's wife, Ginger. It's not clear how much Ginger understands about what her husband does for a living or how cavalier he is about the "under" part in "undercover." But even though she's known the guy since high school we can forgive her any apparent obliviousness since, whatever the variables, we keep getting taken in. Ah-ha! NOW we know what's going on, we think. Wrong.
Soderbergh depicts a labyrinth any self-respecting Minotaur would be happy to enter, popcorn in hoof.
