Fifth power

December 2007 Programmer Daniel Domsheit-Berg at a congress of a group of programmers in Berlin, meets his chat friend - the hacker Julian Assange , the creator of the WikiLeaks website, who positions himself as a human rights activist and makes the secret secret publicly available on his website information. At this congress, Assange tells in his report that one person can reveal all the secrets of the world, the trouble is that people do not have brave leaders for this, because everyone is afraid of punishment. Assange says that thousands of volunteers are sending him information, and the WikiLeaks security system is so advanced that no one, not even Assange himself, can recognize the identity of his informants.

After the congress, Assange informs Berg that the WikiLeaks database has received information about millions of stolen money stored in the Swiss bank Julius Bayer, informants introduced themselves as employees of this bank. Assange instructs Berg to verify this. Berg successfully fulfills this task, and also meets with an informant in Belgium, whom he was informed by one of Assange Bellman's volunteers, and the next day all information about Julius Bayre Assange is posted publicly on the website. However, the bank’s management, by connecting California lawyers, blocks access to the site, but Berga and Assange do not stop this, and they post information on “mirror” sites. As a result, the information gets into the media and they start business against some customers of the bank. And soon they will unblock the WikiLeaks website.

The delighted Berg wants to note this with all of Assange's volunteers: Bellman, Jailim. But it turns out that Assange was hiding under the names of Bellman and Jelim. Apart from him and Berg, no one else is busy with this business, moreover, it turns out that they have only one server at their disposal. Berg is shocked by this lie. However, Assange tells him how in the past his former comrades passed him to the police, which taught him not to rely on others.

WikiLeaks continues to publish classified information from around the world, its popularity is growing. Berg persuades Assange to connect new servers, since one does not cope with the huge influx of site visitors. Together they install 7 new servers in various cities of Europe. Soon Assange and Berg publish information about the members of the British Nationalist Party, which leads to another resonance. However, on this basis, Berg quarrels with his girlfriend Anke, who does not approve of the activities of Berg, and Assange frankly hates it, believing that Berg just wants to become him.

Further, WikiLeaks publishes information about corruption in the Republican Party of the USA and the Government of Peru, about the situation of prisoners in Guantanamo prison , about the September 11 attacks , about the Iranian nuclear program about corruption in an Icelandic bank, which leads to a banking crisis in Iceland . Assange is going to post that the Kenyan police are creating "death squads", but before he can do this, two of his informants are killed in Kenya. Assange blames himself for not posting the information earlier. And Berg's friend Marcus questions the effectiveness of the site’s security system, after checking it, he comes to the conclusion that it is vulnerable, but Assange is angry at Berg that he gave the stranger access to the server. Soon, an article appears in the media where Berg is called the founder of WikiLeaks. Assange is angry that he has appropriated all the glory to himself.

Meanwhile, WikiLeaks is interested in US intelligence agencies, who are unhappy that their secret data is being sent to the Internet. Assange begins to follow. He shows Berg, journalist Nick Davis and his assistant, a footage of the shooting of people from an American attack helicopter sent by a military informant. Berg persuades Assange to submit a video in the states, which leads to another resonance and excitement in the special services. And soon the security services hack into the computers of Assange's people, and also go out to the one who provided the video to WikiLeaks and arrest him. The informant is Bradley Manning , who, in addition to the video, transferred WikiLeaks another half a million secret documents . The United States is on the verge of an international scandal.

Berg chatted with Assange and he reports that he intends to post all the remaining information, moreover, without checking it. Berg tries to dissuade him from this, saying that it is not known what is in these documents and that innocent people may suffer. But by this he only arouses the anger of Assange. Having met Assange in Brussels, Berg organizes a meeting with Nick, and he says that if they want to justify Assange, then all his information must be equated with the news, but for this it needs to be edited, removing what people might suffer from. Assange at first refuses, saying that “WikiLeaks does not edit,” but then agrees and reports that they have one and a half months to edit.

The entire staff of the newspaper Nika begins to edit Assange’s information in bulk, but when 4 days are left until the end of the change, Berg discovers that they are not meeting deadlines due to the astronomical amount of documents. He offers Assange to postpone the publication date, but he decides to post all the information unverified and unedited. Berg again tries to dissuade him, saying that informants could suffer, but Assange is only concerned about the lies that will be revealed as a result of the publication of information, Berg accuses Assange of pursuing personal ambitions. Then Assange, disappointed in Berg, dismisses him. And then he starts chatting with mud, claiming that Berg is sick with paranoid schizophrenia and works for the FBI, and Anke for the CIA.

After the publication of these documents, Assange plans to publish documents of diplomatic correspondence regarding the tyranny of Gaddafi , Russia's illegal introduction of troops into Georgia, and much more. The United States begins to recall its informants from around the world, although several informants are killed due to disclosed information . Berg, realizing that Assange is dangerous, hacks and devastates the WikiLeaks database. Having discovered this, Assange realizes that now they will not be able to send anything.

The film ends with an interview with Julian Assange, hiding at the Embassy of Ecuador in London.

Initially, the role of Assange was planned by Jeremy Renner ^[4] , and the role of Domsheit-Berg was planned by James Makevoy ^[5] .

The original version of the name of the film was: “The Man Who Sold the World” ^[6] .

Filming began on January 23, 2013. Benedict Cumberbatch wore three different wigs, false teeth and blue contact lenses to look like Assange ^[7] . It took a whole year to create a screen saver ^[8] .

The film received mostly negative reviews from critics: on the Rotten Tomatoes website , 37% of reviews are positive, the average rating of the film is 5.4 out of 10 ^[9] . Censuring the script and directing, critics praised the actors' play, especially Benedict Cumberbatch ^[10] , many noted it as the main advantage of the film ^[11] .

In Russia, the film received mixed reviews: 46% of positive reviews from critics.

Assange Opinion

Julian Assange himself, having read the initial script, took the idea of ​​the film negatively and called it “solid lies” and “propaganda” ^[12] , in particular due to the fact that the script hinted at Iranian nuclear developments ^[13] . Assange refused to meet with Benedict Cumberbatch, but then emailed him, which helped Cumberbatch work on the role ^[14] .

In contrast to going to the movies, Assange called to watch Mediastan , a documentary in which journalists and WikiLeaks activists travel to Kazakhstan , Tajikistan , Kyrgyzstan , Turkmenistan , and Afghanistan to invite local media to publish revealing materials. Also, the heroes of the film by Johannes Wallström (a young Swedish journalist, the son of Israel Shamir) meet with The New York Times and The Guardian reporters in order to convict those of lack of freedom of speech in the West.

In October 2013, he sent a letter to Cumberbatch in which he described his attitude to the film and nevertheless agreed to meet ^{[15] [16]} .

• The Fifth Estate at DreamWorks Studios
• Vyacheslav Surikov The Second Coming of Assange , Expert, 10/14/2013
• Mikhail Trofimenkov. Treacherous dissimilarity (neopr.) . Kommersant Weekend Magazine No. 38, p. 18 (October 18, 2013). Date of treatment February 17, 2014.
• Sergey Romanov. The essence of the “Fifth Power” appeared on Kutuzovsky (Neopr.) . Kommersant (October 24, 2013). Date of treatment February 17, 2014.
• Valery Kichin. It’s dangerous to know. The thriller “Fifth Power”, a new look at the verge of a scandal with WikiLeaks (unopened), is being released . Rossiyskaya Gazeta - Federal Issue No. 6214 (238) (October 23, 2013). Date of treatment February 17, 2014.