{"id":1702,"date":"2009-09-27T06:08:47","date_gmt":"2009-09-27T05:08:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/\/?p=1702"},"modified":"2009-09-27T06:08:47","modified_gmt":"2009-09-27T05:08:47","slug":"the-informant-power-of-ambition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/the-informant-power-of-ambition\/","title":{"rendered":"The Informant! – Power of Ambition"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The-Informant-etbscreenwriting\"

I found the fevered unraveling of Matt Damon’s character and his deceptions and lies fascinating to watch. \u00a0There are no big actions sequences, no shoot-outs and no chase scenes. \u00a0If you come to the theater looking for an action-packed thriller like the Bourne<\/strong> series or the sharp witty seriousness of whistler-blower \u00a0Erin Brockovich<\/strong> you will be disappointed. \u00a0SEE THE TRAILER IN VIDEOS<\/p>\n

This is a meticulous character study about the bland banality of corporate greed, the endless self-justification of scheming executives and the deluded self-seeking that’s eating away at the American Dream. \u00a0 The\u00a0upbeat jangle of Marvin Hamlisch’s insistently perky elevator music underscores Whitacre’s deluded optimism. \u00a0Steven Soderbergh deliciously deadpan\u00a0comedy is a brilliant, subtle and painfully funny expose of the empty calories (literally and metaphorically) that’s been making America both overfed and undernourished at the same time.<\/p>\n

Damon’s character is biochemist and ADM Division President, Mark Whitacre, the highest-ranking corporate official in U.S. history to expose wrong-doing in his own company. \u00a0Whitacre sets off\u00a0a massive FBI investigation into a global price-fixing conspiracy filled with secret meetings, concealed taping, wire taps, pay-offs and laundered money in Swiss and Bermuda off-shore accounts.<\/p>\n

The object of all this intrigue is lysine, a sweet corn-based food additive, that is in nearly everything we eat or drink. \u00a0As the movie opens, Whitacer glowingly describes the many lucrative uses of \u00a0his company’s products (\u201ccorn goes in one end, profit comes out the other\u201d). \u00a0When a virus derails the company’s\u00a0production of \u00a0lysine, Whitacere is forced to come up with a solution fast.<\/p>\n

He lies and tells management there’s a mole in the company, a corporate saboteur from a Japanese rival who wants a payoff to stop injecting the virus into the production line. Whitacre is shocked when the company calls in the FBI. Special Agents Brian Shepard (Scott Bakula) and Bob Herndon (Joel McHale), catch Whitacre in the lie about the mole and the fun begins as Whitacre spins an even bigger story. \u00a0He accuses ADM of\u00a0fixing prices and divvying up the market for the corn-based food additive by ADM and other international corporate giants.<\/p>\n

Whitacre begins an increasingly bizarre journey where lie enfolds lie. \u00a0The dorky but puppy dog charming scientist with the floppy pompadour toupee likens his situation in ADM to Tom Cruise in The Firm<\/strong>. \u00a0It’s an apt, if over-weaning, comparison to another Power of Ambition character. \u00a0An even closer movie comparison would be to Matt Damon in The Talented Mr. Ripley<\/strong>, a\u00a0movie that also explores dark and twisted side of the Power of Ambition character.<\/p>\n

Like Ripley, Mark Whitacre is a bland but eager to please guy who is obsessed with being liked and inflating his own importance. \u00a0Whitacre believes he should be running ADM and uses the price-fixing conspiracy to oust his superiors.\u00a0He is obsessed with assessing the relative friendliness of everyone he meets. \u00a0Despite his double-dealings, greed and moral transgressions he believes that he is one of the “good guys” and his many “good friends” at ADM will welcome him into the top spot after he has taken most of the company management down. \u00a0He lies about a key biographical fact because of a study about personal likeablity. He justifies every twisted manipulation of the truth or of others with an incessant internal dialogue filled with odd facts, off-kilter observations and self-promoting rationalizations.<\/p>\n

Like all Power of Ambition characters Whitacre is exceptionally adept at self-justification and at distracting himself from his own crimes and ethical short-comings. \u00a0 Always the eternal optimist Whitacre enthuses, “There are so many really nice people in the world.” even as his web of deception is unraveling around him and one last lie earns him three times the prison sentence the other executives face.<\/p>\n

\"Power_of_Ambition

Power of Ambition characters can be aspirational characters who want to rise from a lowly station to a more exalted one. Or they can be prostitutes, frauds, fakers or con artists, always on the hustle. In either case, their personal vanity, status, popularity and social importance is key to these characters sense of self.<\/p>\n

SEE THE TRAILER IN VIDEOS<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Matt Damon plays a pitch perfect Power of Ambition protagonist. A close movie comparison would be to Damon’s The Talented Mr. Ripley, another movie that explores dark and twisted side of the Power of Ambition character.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11959,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,51,45],"tags":[860,25,26,27,28,30,31,670,32,637,861,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,676,862,863,864,41,865,42],"class_list":["post-1702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movies-character-development-screenwriting-screenplay-script-blog","category-power-of-ambition","category-video-clips-television-movies-series","tag-all-about-eve","tag-character","tag-characters","tag-emotional-toolbox","tag-etb","tag-film","tag-films","tag-jerry-maguire","tag-laurie-hutzler","tag-liar-liar","tag-matt-damon","tag-movies","tag-nine-character-types","tag-screenplay","tag-screenplays","tag-screenwriting","tag-script","tag-scripts","tag-scriptwriting","tag-the-firm","tag-the-informant","tag-the-talented-mr-ripley","tag-tom-cruise","tag-tv","tag-whistleblowers","tag-writing"],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-300x225.jpg",300,225,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-768x576.jpg",768,576,true],"large":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"ttshowcase_normal":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",125,94,false],"ttshowcase_small":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",75,56,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"Image Size 500x500":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",500,375,false],"woocommerce_thumbnail":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-300x400.jpg",300,400,true],"woocommerce_single":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-600x450.jpg",600,450,true],"woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-100x100.jpg",100,100,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Laurie Hutzler","author_link":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/author\/admin\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Matt Damon plays a pitch perfect Power of Ambition protagonist. A close movie comparison would be to Damon's The Talented Mr. Ripley, another movie that explores dark and twisted side of the Power of Ambition character.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1702"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1702\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}