The Informant!

[MacGuffin]

Matt Damon is Soderbergh's Informant

Matt Damon will star in the feature adaptation of The Informant for helmer Steven Soderbergh and Warner Bros. Pictures, reports Variety. Scott Z Burns is penning the adaptation of the book.

It is unclear when pic will start shooting, as Soderbergh first will direct Ocean's Twelve for Warner Bros. The studio and Village Roadshow Pictures are eyeing a March 2004 start date for the Ocean's Eleven sequel, with Soderbergh, star George Clooney and producer Jerry Weintraub locked in. Some other original cast members will return, accompanied by new actors for the second pic.

"Informant" centers around the story of Mark Whitacre, a high-level mole at the self-declared "supermarket to the world," Archer Daniels Midland. Whitacre wore an FBI wire for more than two years to uncover a major price-fixing scam with ADM's Japanese competitors that brought the company millions of dollars in profit. ADM pled guilty in 1996 and paid a $100 million fine.

[Duck Sauce]

So Soderbergh ought to have 3 or 4 movies made by the time the Informant even starts filming.

[©brad]

So Soderbergh ought to have 3 or 4 movies made by the time the Informant even starts filming.

No joke. I thought he was taking a break... a break to him means only 2 movies a year.

[Jon]

Um, in an interview, when he said he does one big one then a few small ones, Soderbergh called it "Ocean's Twelve".

[MacGuffin]

Damon Moves Forward With Soderbergh's 'Informant'
Source: MTV

If Matt Damon could be said to have a specialty, it's in playing characters who aren't necessarily what they seem: the janitor who's actually a super-genius, the charming extrovert who happens to be a homicidal maniac, the police officer whose true allegiance lies with the Boston Mob. If you think those guys are duplicitous, the Oscar-winner grinned, wait'll you get a load of his next character, Mark Whitacre.

"This one [is more two-faced] than ever before," Damon said, smiling.

Whitacre is the central character in "The Informant," a movie Damon and director Steven Soderbergh have "been trying to get made for years," he said (information on the movie, scattered across the internet, began popping up in 2003), but which the pair will finally begin filming "starting April 15th," Damon revealed.

A former Division President with Archer Daniels Midland, a Fortune 500 company which in 2006 took in $36.6 BILLION in revenue, Whitacre turned whistleblower, becoming the highest ranking executive to ever wear a wire for the FBI. But all was not as noble as it seemed, Damon reported. "[There was] a price-fixing scandal at Archer Daniels Midland, which is a huge American company in Illinois, and this guy, this young executive, wore a wire for the FBI for two years and built the case against them," Damon revealed of his character. "But the guy was really interesting; he turned out to be kind of a pathological liar about a bunch of stuff."

While Whitacre was helping the FBI, he was also simultaneously defrauding ADM out of $9 million, making him, insisted Damon, "a really great character."

Due to the start date of "The Informant" Damon was unsure whether he'd be able to star in Paul Greengrass's "Imperial Life in the Emerald City," a movie that will take a critical look at the American reconstruction in Iraq. "I'm hoping to," he insisted. "[But] there's a little question as to whether or not the schedule will work."

Either way, whether it's Greengrass or Soderbergh, Damon knows he'll be good hands with his next director.

"I'm getting a chance to work with [directors who] are really just so good, and I learn so much watching them," Damon asserted, adding with a wide grin. "And they're my friends, so I want to work basically every chance I can get."

[Gold Trumpet]

SPOILERS


This is also based on a book of the same name by Kurt Einchenwald.

I read it last year. It's really good. Damon is right about the character. The depth of betrayal in The Departed is nothing compared to what the person he will play in this book does. He gets into the worst predicament possible and continues to make it worst with even more outrageous lies. He isolates himself from everyone so much it felt like he had a death wish. What he got was even worst: the biggest embarrassment and scandal possible.

If Soderbergh does this right, it should be the first demanding performance for Damon. The only tie Damon has to the character is that he does business suit roles well. But this film should focus on the fall out of the person; his reduction to ridiculousness and his change to someone who is beyond hope of resembling a normal human being. He really becomes pathetic. The portrait of him in the book became queasy to read because he was screwing everything up so bad. If the portrait in the film is of a cunning villain, it's all wrong.

[MacGuffin]

Bakula joins Soderbergh's 'Informant'
Warner Independent thriller stars Matt Damon
Source: Variety

Scott Bakula has scored the second lead role opposite Matt Damon in "The Informant," Steven Soderbergh's espionage thriller for Warner Independent.

Bakula will play Brian Shepherd, an FBI agent who exposes an international price-fixing scheme with the help of biochemist Mark Whitacre (Damon). Project is based on a true story; Scott Burns adapted the book by Kurt Eichenwald.

Participant Media and Groundswell are co-producing with WIP. Jennifer Fox and Gregory Jacobs are producing.

Bakula recently appeared on "Boston Legal," reuniting with his "Murphy Brown" co-star Candice Bergen. He is starring in "Dancing in the Dark" at San Diego's Old Globe Theater.

[MacGuffin]

First Look: Matt Damon In The Informant

Matt Damon is down in Decatur, Illinois with old Ocean's pal Steven Soderbergh. The two are currently working on The Informant, where Damon plays Mark Whitacre, one of the men involved in the mid-90s lysine price-fixing scandal.

We're not exactly sure what that conspiracy was, but you better believe we'll be looking it up in the next couple of months.

[modage]

THE INFORMANT
In theatres on September 18
(Warner Bros. Pictures)

Director: Steven Soderbergh
Writers: Screenplay by Scott Z. Burns
Based on the book The Informant (A True Story) by Kurt Eichenwald
Producers: Gregory Jacobs, Jennifer Fox, Howard Braunstein, Kurt Eichenwald
Executive Producers: George Clooney, Jeff Skoll, Michael London

Cast: Matt Damon, Scott Bakula, Joel McHale, Melanie Lynskey

Offbeat Comedy. What was Mark Whitacre thinking? A rising star at agri-industry giant Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Whitacre suddenly turns whistleblower. Even as he exposes his company's multi-national price-fixing conspiracy to the FBI, Whitacre envisions himself being hailed as a hero of the common man and handed a promotion. But before all that can happen, the FBI needs evidence, so Whitacre eagerly agrees to wear a wire and carry a hidden tape recorder in his briefcase, imagining himself as a kind of de facto secret agent. Unfortunately for the FBI, their lead witness hasn't been quite so forthcoming about helping himself to the corporate coffers. Whitacre's ever-changing account frustrates the agents and threatens the case against ADM as it becomes almost impossible to decipher what is real and what is the product of Whitacre's rambling imagination. Based on the true story of the highest-ranking corporate whistleblower in U.S. history.

[Pedro]

This is a fascinating story.  I heard it on an episode of This American Life a long while back.  If anyone wants to know all about it (but also how the movie will most likely end) you should check it out.

http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=168

[Neil]

My father in law was in this movie. he was an airline pilot extra. he's in a scene with damon and out of the 3 takes they shot. he said he got his face in there in 2 of them. ha ha. so hopefully you all can catch that major appearance!!!

[modage]

aicn test screening review: http://www.aintitcool.com/node/39997

[Stefen]

Soderbergh is back to cranking them out at a feverish pace. Thank god.

[cinemanarchist]

trailer: http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/theinformant/

[polkablues]

I'm excited.  That looks really entertaining.