A few years ago, it felt like Wikileaks
just came out of nowhere. We Steal
Secrets: The Story of Wikileaks basically reaffirms my belief that it
basically did. As much as the film
follows the rise and subsequently dubious fall (maybe?) of Wikileaks, it's also
a bit of a documentary about leader Julian Assange whose first act of secret
stealing can actually be allegedly traced back to
1989 with a security breach at NASA during the launch of Galileo, a Jupiter
probe.
We Steal
Secrets uses interviews from a variety of sources, including those who
worked very closely with Assange. One of the women who accused Assange of
sexual assault is also interviewed, and that issue, which I felt was never clearly
reported in the media, is explained in full detail (almost ad nauseum). In fact, Assange himself is even included in an interview,
though by that point, it seems rather silly and redundant. Plenty of footage
from press conferences and speeches he'd made at various events makes its way
into the documentary, and that more than speaks for him.
Almost equal attention is paid
to Bradley Manning, the alleged source of the greatest amount of incriminating
documents against the U.S. While that occasionally felt a bit tedious because I
didn't want to split my focus between Assange and Manning, Manning's story
plays just as much importance to the rise of Wikileaks, and so it is almost
essential for Gibney to include it.
Gibney does a fabulous job
laying out all of the details of Assange's and Wikileak's rise to notoriety,
though the story itself is a bit bizarre in some places. It's clearly a very
well researched film with information pulled directly from many different
resources. I think some of the most interesting information included deals with
Assange's plans for the future. I couldn't quite keep my snort of derision to
myself.
