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To me, this movie is perfection.

Highly Overrated But Still Good

Good movie but grossly overrated

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Gary Webb, a journalist for a smallish news agency, stumbles upon a story which proves the CIA used cocaine profits from Central American drug smugglers to fund the Contra rebels. Never heard about it? Me neither, and in fact when the full report was published it was pushed aside by a scandal involving Bill Clinton. So, nearly a decade later, it's time to explore this intriguing story and fortunately this film is absolutely compelling. Yes, the film is about the CIA's involvement in Nicaragua, but beneath this is an individual who only desires to report the truth. Investigating a story with this much classification and secrecy results in the possibility of endangering both your career and family. But the biggest detriment, is to yourself. We see Gary Webb slowly degrade as the investigation takes its toll on him, he gradually becomes a broken man so transfixed on this job that he risks losing everything else. I found it to be utterly heartbreaking, yet rather relatable. This drama didn't need to include any thrills or chase sequences (in the fear that it becomes an action film), and yet director Michael Cuesta was bold enough to incorporate these tense pursuits. They worked. I was on edge. Why? Because Gary Webb was a well developed character. I felt for him and wanted him to succeed. This, for me, is Jeremy Renner's best performance. Forget about the supporting cast, this was his for the taking and he owned it. Emotional, physical and charismatic. Should've been nominated for more awards. The first half was a slow burner, but it picked up pace as soon as the story was established. The supporting cast were wasted, Winstead was probably the best out of them all but still underused. But due to a powerful central performance, this film was elevated to an enthralling level of intrigue. Oh, and the final screen texts detailing the aftermath? It crushed me inside. Gutted.

Kill the Messenger, director Michael Cuesta's re-telling of journalist Gary Webb's expose of the CIA's illegal funding of Nicaraguan Contra rebels and its links to the crack epidemic sweeping across the country, has all the ingredients for a gripping, fact-based drama centred around a story everybody should know more about (at the time, people were distracted by Bill Clinton's White House antics involving Monica Lewinsky). Seminal movies such as All the President's Men and Zodiac portrayed the dangers that come with investigative journalism and managed keep a real-life story suspenseful despite many knowing the outcome already. Kill the Messenger sadly doesn't achieve much of this, and although the movie is competently made and solidly acted, it struggles to hold the attention it should demand by playing things frustratingly formal.Jeremy Renner stars as Webb, the goateed, informally-dressed San Jose Mercury News reporter who carries more than a whiff of anti- establishment about him. While investigating the government seizure of drug dealer's property, even when they've been found innocent, he is handed court papers which seem to reveal that a major drug runner is actually a CIA operative. It's a revelation that will change Webb's life, and he is soon on the government's radar when he follows leads to kingpin Rick Ross (Michael Kenneth Williams) and eventually to Managua to meet with cartel boss Norwin Meneses (Andy Garcia). Everything he uncovers seems to suggest that the CIA, committing high treason in the process, is indirectly funding the wave of crack decimating entire neighbourhoods throughout the U.S. Webb reports his findings in a three-part series entitled Dark Alliance, which quickly becomes one of the internet's first viral hits, before the CIA decide to turn his world upside down.In many ways, the story of a little guy being cruelly picked apart by higher powers is comparable to the one told in The Insider. Yet Michael Mann's masterpiece also demonstrated that a film can be grounded in fact and procedural while keeping the audience engrossed in the story it's telling. Kill the Messenger wisely reserves a large chunk of the running time for what Webb went through after breaking the story, but much of this is bogged down in clichéd domestic squabbles, with Rosemarie DeWitt finding herself criminally underwritten as the nagging wife whose feelings drastically change from one scene to the next. However, it has its moments, especially when showing how Webb was surgically discredited while his bosses (played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Oliver Platt) slowly distanced themselves from the negative attention. Renner manages to carry the film despite not being given a whole lot to do apart from exchanging a few "I'm right, you're wrong," arguments with his colleagues. The real-life story alone is shocking enough to make the film worth a watch, but there's a emptiness at its core.

Interesting story of the vile corruption in America.Poorly researched.Poorly put together.Total failure in showing how and why Mr Webb supposedly killed himself with two bullets.Or was murdered.Mr Renner played very monotonously. Inhuman.Watchable.Disappointing.I don't know if there was a casting issue for Webb's wife. I'd've probably killed myself if I'd a scraggy wife like that. Not an appealing choice. But in real life he had several children with her, so probably was not her.Why on earth did he pop off to stay in that hotel? And if your bike's stolen why do you add to your woes by then vandalising your own car? There's no sense in it. We need an investigative reporter to decypher this movie it seems.A remake is necessary to show the exact events of the true story. Ie not US corruption, but Mr Webb's death.

Nice acting all around. Especially the central figure, Jeremy Renner, whom I like a lot. The reasons I find him admirable are not just that he's a reliable actor, which he is, but that he's no taller and no more handsome than I am. (Let us operationalize our value judgments.) I respect the location shooting too, and I lived in San Jose about the time these events were transpiring. Elections were underway. And I found the coverage of the San Jose Mercury-News to be at least the equal of those two colossi to the north, the Chronicle and the Examiner. I was doing research on the milieu to which recently discharged psychiatric patients were trying to adjust, and the Mercury-News was a fountain of data. The CIA are after reporter Gary Webb for spilling some beans that should not have been spilled. A pretty olla podrida of rotten beans too. The CIA had been selling cocaine in the black districts of Los Angeles in order to fund illegal arms shipments to a CIA-sponsored revolutionary group in Nicaragua, ruled by a government we didn't like. There was never much doubt about the CIA's illegal support of the Contras. The president said that the facts led him to believe it was true. The question had to do with the importation of crack cocaine and its sale by the CIA.It was controversial and important stuff. It received a great deal of criticism from papers like the Post and the L.A. Times. The Inspector General's report acknowledged that the CIA had indeed worked with suspected drug runners while supporting the contras. The public wasn't anxious to hear its judicial icons knee-capped, I guess, because there were plenty of pick up trucks around with bumper stickers calling for Ollie North to be president. Ollie North was the instrument that organized the illegal operation because, as his secretary put it, they had to answer to a higher authority than the United States Constitution. And why not "North For President?" When you get right down to it, what else is the constitution but an old piece of paper crawling with germs?But the strength of the story is knee-capped by dramatic misstatements. It is simply not well written. A man calls Webb in the middle of the night and warns him to be alert. The man on the other end, calling alone from an office, is whispering. Why is he whispering? Okay. There are shots of Webb coming and going at his home and at work. The shots are dominated by gigantic close ups of solemn faces. Why? Close ups, if necessary, are used for portentous moments unless you're making a commercial for a toothpaste. The ultimate effect is that of being hit over the head with a crowbar.Okay. Webb is sitting at home with his wife, his adolescent son lounging in the doorway, during a visit by Webb's sympathetic young editor and boss. The editor hesitantly tells Webb that the CIA had dug into his past and found evidence of an extra-marital liaison. The guy's family knows nothing of this and the friendly editor pops up with this news item that threatens its integrity.Okay. We're now in the garage where Webb is trying to explain the affair to his son. The kid, who is about sixteen, is so choked up, so close to tears, that he can barely speak. "I made a mistake!", explains Webb. "Did -- did you love her?" "Do you love Mom?" "I'm really disappointed in you." I don't believe a word of that conversation.The film is based on a book by Gary Webb. Everybody wants to be the hero of his own story. Nobody wants to be comic relief.The writers need to go back and watch "The Insider" again and pick up all the mistakes they should have avoided. Then they should watch "All the President's Men" again to see how it should be done. The director needs someone to tell him he's making a dramatic feature film, not a commercial for Mennen underarm deodorant or one of those Canadian specials that show us a universe filled with betrayal and heartbreak on Lifetime Movie Network.Yet there are implications that, however muted, take us beyond one hero's tragedy. The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times both try to torpedo Webb's story, not only because they question his sources but evidently because they dislike seeing hot news in a smaller newspaper. They "attack the messenger" by digging into his private life as if this somehow taints his story -- which it does. The logical fallacy is called "ad hominem", meaning "to the man." It works very well, even now.