Product: The Insider [VHS] (1999)
Rating: 2.0
Astonishingly thin
One would presume that, under the helm of Michael Mann, and with the talents of Al Pacino and Russel Crowe (Mann and Pacino having made one of the best films of the nineties, Heat)that The Insider would be as taut, engaging, engrossing thriller as you could get. However, there simply is nothing there. The story itself is hardly engaging, telling you facts about smoking you already knew ( the whole 'mystery' revealed by Crowe that the film hangs on for the first hour is that cigarettes are actually harmful)thus we must rely on the acting and directing to pull us through a so-so story. Of course, Al Pacino is good. Crowe, however, is hardly oscar-worthy. He gives a much better performance in LA Confidential or even Romper Stomper. The fact that the press have billed his performance as 'the best this year' is quite unfortunate, a burden, even. Characterisation is thin, we never really learn anything of Wigand's family, or Bergman's (a strength of Heat, I have to say), and so we're stuck with two potentially engaging cahracters floundering undeer the weight of a potentially 'huge' story. There are some good scenes, Pacino chews up soem excellent dialogue, but as a whole, The Insider is, for me, nothing more that an excellent director's effort to repeat past masterpieces.