Was this movie funded by the State Dept. or by the Pentagon? Either way watching this snail-fest of a yawn inducing story exudes typical signatures of State sponsored propaganda that anyone born before 1980 will recognise immediately. Sad to see such great acting names roped in by either money or CIA influence.

Avoid like Ebola.

It's rare to find a movie of this stature. Brilliant performances by Pacino and Crowe, especially the former. The pace is intense, the direction brilliant! Not a flaw in this one. Go watch it! Your every minute will be well spent.

There are basically two interlinked stories here. One is about Mike Wallace a charismatic television personality, who caved in to corporate power. The other is the story of Jeff Wigand, a bumbling character who was persuaded to take on a company I'd never heard of called Brown & Williamson, a subsidiary of British American Tobacco. He eventually succeeded in changing the public's perceptions of the effects of smoking. Although the public may have been quite aware of those effects already. Crowe looks a bit like Wigand, and Plummer looks quite like Wallace. Pacino, who played the persuader, Lowell Bergman, a reporter, doesn't look like him. It seems that Crowe spent a lot of time with Wigand so that he could imitate him in the film. Bergman has said that the film was emotionally, politically and, in general, dead-on accurate. He terminally fell out with Wallace.

Wallace is said to have hated this portrayal of him. But the force of corporate power is a given. Not many are as resolute as, say, Thomas More. It's an extremely unusual man who stands up to corporate pressure.

However, the question I was left asking myself was: How addictive is nicotine, and: is it the nicotine which harms the body, or is it the smoke of the tobacco leaves ? I used to be a fairly heavy smoker – 30 or 35 cigarettes a day; but gave up on 16 November 2010 and have only smoked about 15 cigarettes since, after finding them lying around the house. I think it's more of a habit than an addiction. The film is too long.