Russell Crowe is up there at the top

Rating: Null/10 (13 March 2000)

This film is worth seeing just for Russell Crowe's performance as 'whistle blower', Jeffrey Wigand. The first Russell Crowe film I saw, was "Romper Stomper" Then, another Australian film: "The Sum of Us" Two totally different roles, both of which he handled with aplomb.Next thing I know, he's acting alongside Kevin Spacey in "L.A. Confidential", which, I thought was his best role to date. Then along came:"The Insider" Pacino is good, as always. Christopher Plummer is brilliant as Mike Wallace (he even looks like him), but Russell Crowe outshines them all. He looks and acts the part of a man on the edge. He has a well paid job. A good life style (on the surface, at least). He also is deeply unhappy about the business ethics (tobacco companies have ethics?) of his superiors, and he's prepared to put all that on the line; to blow the whistle. Jeffrey Wigand was a very courageous man, and it's a tribute to Russell Crowe's acting that you think it's Wigand himself, up on the screen. A few quibbles: The film was a little too 'preachy' read: 'heavy-handed', when dealing with the evils of cigarette smoking - the scene where the 'seven dwarfs' are testifying before a Congressional (Senate?) Committee, needed only to be shown once, in my opinion. That aside, 'The Insider' is a powerful film, and Michael Mann, a very underrated director - it's been a long time between "Heat", and this, and before 'Heat'? 'The Keep', or was it 'Thief'?