It isn't often I review a documentary, but it also isn't often that one comes around and takes the film world by storm the was You Can See Everything has. Just over a month ago the film was shown at a surprise screening at the Telluride Film Festival, with viewers being treated not just to something they didn't know they'd get to see, but something that many didn't know existed at all. The idea of a film festival surprise screening being a three hour long documentary sounds crazy, but the buzz that came out was frankly insane, and the film's appearance at the New York Film Festival only heightened its already growing hype train. Now, the film is out there for all to see, and it is simply one of the craziest cinematic experiences I can remember.
If you've managed to avoid the internet this weekend, You Can See Everything is a documentary collaboration between Lance Oppenheim (who also directed Primetime), and beloved comedian/filmmaker Nathan Fielder. The pair were invited to spend a few weeks documenting the lives of the infamous Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes and her family before the start of her prison sentence. The letterboxd synopsis goes on to say: "What begins as an intimate portrait of an enigmatic felon becomes a mind-bending three-year journey into the abyss." Frankly I don't think I could sum it up much better than that, as this is a three hour odyssey of deception and misinformation casting a web that leaves you with more questions than answers by the end.
This is admittedly a hard film to talk about to those who haven't seen it, as a lot of what makes the film such a great experience is the constant unpredictability of it. The amount of gasps throughout the theatre I saw this in was perhaps only matched by the amount of jaws that were on the floor. Fielder has made a name for himself largely through his ability to catch people offguard and bend the truth, so putting him face to face with someone as seemingly manipulative as Holmes truly feels like an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object. Spending time so intimately with Holmes and Evans is a relentlessly fascinating experience, especially just watching Holmes speak and act so firm in her belief that she hasn't done wrong. You're constantly lingering on every word she says waiting for Fielder to cause some kind of revelation, only for each passing moment to leave you more unsure.
The second half of the film goes directions I never could have guessed, offering a pretty stark departure from the set up at times but in a way that brilliantly drives home the ideas Fielder and Oppenheim are tackling. That's all the details I'm willing to give, as this is a rare documentary that I think you actually can spoil and I would hate to infringe upon any surprise the film offers. This is one of the most timely films I can think of, and one that takes an approach I'm not sure we'll ever see again at least not to this scale. I'd love to go into more specifics, but my stance on the film is ultimately just that you need to go see it, this is something truly special and you simply don't want to miss it. Easy 5/5
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