255 reviews
Sales Rank: 5846

Format: Ac-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dvd-video, Widescreen, Ntsc
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 158
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
DVD Layers: 2
DVD Sides: 1
Picture Format: Anamorphic Widescreen
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.1
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.4 x 0.6

MPN: 717951007391
ISBN: 0788820591
UPC: 717951007391
EAN: 9780788820595
ASIN: B00003CWRX

Theatrical Release Date: 1999
Release Date: April 11, 2000
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days

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Editorial Reviews:

Amazon.com essential video
As revisionist history, Michael Mann's intelligent docudrama The Insider is a simmering brew of altered facts and dramatic license. In a broader perspective, however, the film (cowritten with Forrest Gump Oscar-winner Eric Roth) is effectively accurate as an engrossing study of ethics in the corruptible industries of tobacco and broadcast journalism. On one side, there is Jeffrey Wigand (Russell Crowe), the former tobacco scientist who violated contractual agreements to expose Brown & Williamson's inclusion of addictive ingredients in cigarettes, casting himself into a vortex of moral dilemma. On the other side is 60 Minutes producer Lowell Bergman (Al Pacino), whose struggle to report Wigand's story puts him at odds with veteran correspondent Mike Wallace (Christopher Plummer) and senior executives at CBS News.

As the urgency of the story increases, so does the film's palpable sense of paranoia, inviting favorable comparison to All the President's Men. While Pacino downplays the theatrical excess that plagued him in previous roles, Crow is superb as a man who retains his tortured integrity at great personal cost. The Insider is two movies--a cover-up thriller and a drama about journalistic ethics--that combine to embrace the noble values personified by Wigand and Bergman. Even if the details aren't always precise (as Mike Wallace and others protested prior to the film's release), the film adheres to a higher truth that was so blatantly violated by tobacco executives seen in an oft-repeated video clip, lying under oath in the service of greed. --Jeff Shannon

Product Description
Recounts the chain of events that pitted an ordinary man against the tobacco industry, and dragged two people into the fight of their lives.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: R
Release Date: 1-JUN-2004
Media Type: DVD

Customer Reviews: Read 250 more reviews...

4 out of 5 stars

Gripping tale of men under pressure for doing what is right October 3, 2008
Gripping tale of two men laying everything on the line for what they believe in. Well-acted by the two leads Russell Crowe as a whistle-blowing former tobacco company executive Jeffrey Wigand, and Al Pacino as maverick "60 Minutes" producer Lowell Bergman, plus a superb performance by Christopher Plummer as Mike Wallace. Overwrought at times but Director Michael Mann successfully maintains a creepy, claustophobic atmosphere throughout, reflecting the pressure and scrutiny on Wigand. Excellent use of music and lighting as well. An usually critical look at big business for a mainstream American non-fiction film.

5 out of 5 stars

A Masterpiece May 27, 2008
Wow! Al Pacino (terrific and not overacting!) and Russell Crowe (devastating performance) in a "based on true story" about the tobacco industry, "60-Minutes," Mike Wallace (brilliantly played by Christopher Plummer and conspiracy to addict Americans.

4 out of 5 stars

Great Movie!!! April 11, 2008
This was recommended to me by a quit smoking group. I highly recommend this to smokers/non-smokers alike. If I had known about this, I would have never started smoking. 4 ****!!!

4 out of 5 stars

tobacco industry April 5, 2008
A great expose of the tobacco industry and their lies to get their product sold and you addicted to nicotine. It also shows the destructive power of bad corporations that don't care about the public good.

5 out of 5 stars

Riveting movie about how Mike Wallace buckled over to CBS bigwigs and big tobacco January 13, 2008
Everyone does a great job of acting. I forgot this was a movie as I watched it. I was outraged that the poor smuck that trusted 60 MINUTES to run his expose of the tobacco industry was abandoned by Mike Wallace and his gang and that he lost everything, his retirement income, his home and his wife and litle girls, while Wallace's big worry was how he would be remembered after he retired from 60 MINUTES.