What’s this all about?
In 2016, Oliver Stone, award winning director and noted crackpot gave us Snowden, the story of Edward Snowden, the CIA whistle blower who revealed the CIA’s troubling habit of indiscriminately spying on U.S. citizens without warrants, under the guise of “stopping terrorism.”
The film details his career in national security through the lens of his leaking of classified data to reporters while hiding out in, and ultimately escaping from, a Hong Kong hotel.
Who is Nick in this one?
Nick plays “Hank Forrester,” a CIA trainer who appears to specialize in antiques, agency history, and cryptography who befriends the titular Snowden early in his career. Nick’s only in three scenes, so expect some repeats in our best/worst selections.
Who else is in this one?
Joseph Gordon-Levitt (The kid from Third Rock From The Sun) plays Edward Snowden. His voice sounds different in this role than I’ve ever heard it before, so that’s acting, I guess. He’s fine. Good, even.
Zachary Quinto (Young “Spock” from the J.J. Abrams Star Trek) plays some reporter. It’s kind of a puny role. I’m sure that the real guy that he’s playing was important, but basically, he yells about editors a couple of times and that’s it, which is too bad, because I like Zachary Quinto.
Timothy Olyphant (Raylan Givens, from Justified) plays a smooth but unscrupulous CIA agent, just as he should.
Did you see that?
The pickings are slim on this one gang.
In the first scene in which Snowden has an epileptic seizure, we see his glasses fog over as he looks into a pot of boiling pasta, just before he collapses. Before he even hits the ground, the lenses are clear again. I wish it worked like that. -Michael
Editor’s Note: Sarah did not submit a “did you see that,” for this film, so I must suppose that she did not, in fact, see that.
What were Nick’s best parts?
Nick’s first scene is arguably the best. Snowden wanders into his work area, and the two discuss the now ancient cryptography and computing equipment in the room. Nick convincingly plays a man who is genuinely interested in Enigma machines and Cray supercomputers, and who wants to share that passion. -Michael
I agree, this was clearly the best scene. The second scene towards the beginning of the movie was also quite good. In this scene we learn that Nick tried to follow the facts, common sense, and what’s right for the people of this country in general, but against politics and it cost him his career. He did a good job. -Sarah
What were Nick’s worst parts?
In one of the film’s final scenes, we see Nick again, this time in a recliner in what I assume is his living room, watching the news coverage of Snowden’s escape. He yells into the kitchen at some woman, and says something like, “hey, he finally did it!” as if Snowden had been trying to do this for years, and as if Nick’s character had been somehow involved.
He hadn’t, and he wasn’t.
It was like Oliver Stone was wrapping up shooting and went, “oh shit, Nick Cage is still here? We’d better put him in a scene, I guess,” and it somehow it made it into the movie. -Michael
Agreed. I don’t think Nick did a bad job acting wise, but the scene doesn’t make much sense. -Sarah
How was the movie?
It was fine. As far as Oliver Stone films go, it was good, even. The characters shown were believable and interesting, and the film did a good job making complex technical and legal concepts clear to the viewer.
The ending is underwhelming, but that’s sadly accurate. The TL;DR version of the plot (and actual history) is, “A guy revealed that the US government did a bunch of illegal shit that they’re strictly prohibited from doing. Then that guy went into hiding in Russia, and the US government basically just kept doing whatever it wanted, and we all forgot about it two weeks later.” -Michael
I enjoyed this movie a lot. Of course we’ve been on a run of bad films for a while. It was a welcome and refreshing change. -Sarah
Yeah, but did you like it?
It was a little dry for me, but it was well made, well acted, mostly accurate, and under three hours long. What more could you ask of an Oliver Stone movie? -Michael
Yes -Sarah
Where can I watch it?
It’s free on Tubi (not a sponsor, I swear).
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