Найруулагч Натан Филдер болон Лэнс Оппенхайм нарын шинэ баримтат кино нь Theranos компанийн залилангийн хэрэгт буруутгагдсан Элизабет Холмсын амьдралыг өөр өнцгөөс харуулжээ.
A24 студийн бүтээл “You Can See Everything” баримтат кинонд 2022 онд Theranos компанийн хөрөнгө оруулагчдыг мэхэлсэн хэргээр 11 гаруй жилийн хорих ял сонссон Элизабет Холмсын түүхийг өгүүлдэг. Тэрээр 2023 оны тавдугаар сард шоронд орохоосоо 35 хоногийн өмнө сүйт залуу Билли Эвансын хамт найруулагч Натан Филдер болон түүний багийнхныг Калифорни дахь гэртээ урьж, өөрийн байр суурийг илэрхийлэх боломжийг олгосон байна.
Киноны туршид Холмс өөрийн технологийн талаарх хөрөнгө оруулагчдад өгсөн амлалтууд нь зөвхөн үгсийн утгын буруу ойлголцлоос үүдэлтэй гэж тайлбарладаг. Гэвч баримтат киноны гол анхаарал нь Холмс руу бус, харин түүний сүйт залуу Билли Эванс руу чиглэжээ. Эванс нь Холмсын нэрийн өмнөөс олон нийтийн сүлжээнд пост бичих, хиймэл оюун ухаан ашиглан түүний дүр төрхийг бүтээх болон санхүүгийн бүх асуудлыг нь хянах зэргээр түүний амьдралд хүчтэй нөлөө үзүүлдэг болох нь илэрсэн байна.
Натан Филдер Холмсын гэм буруутай эсэх болон түүнийг хэн нэгэн удирдаж байгаа эсэхийг тодруулахыг оролддог ч киноны төгсгөлд үзэгчид тодорхой хариулт авч чаддаггүй. Энэхүү баримтат кино нь АНУ-ын кино театруудаар гарч эхэлсэн бөгөөд 11 дүгээр сарын 20-нд Их Британид нээлтээ хийхээр товлогджээ.
Дэлгэрэнгүй эх сурвалжийг харах
Эх сурвалжийг нээх ↓
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In 1998, President Bill Clinton faced questioning by a grand jury who accused him of lying about the nature of his relationship with Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern. When the president was asked whether his lawyer had spoken falsely by declaring “there is no sexual relationship” between the pair, Clinton smiled and, raising an eyebrow, famously replied: “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.”
*WARNING: Spoilers ahead for You Can See Everything.*
In Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s sublime A24 documentary, You Can See Everything, the filmmakers spend time with another American figure who appears to have a similarly sharp eye for semantics and a slippery grasp of the truth. In 2022, Elizabeth Holmes was convicted of defrauding investors in her medical start-up Theranos out of billions of dollars and sentenced to over 11 years in prison. She says it’s all one big misunderstanding over the word “can”.
In the 35 days before she reported to jail in May 2023, Holmes and her fiancé, Billy Evans, invited The Rehearsal star Fielder and his film crew into their rented cottage in Del Mar, Southern California, in the hopes of sharing her side of the story.
Early on in the three-hour film, she explains to Fielder that when she told potential investors that she had invented blood-testing technology that “can” perform almost limitless medical tests using just a couple of drops of blood, what she meant was that this would eventually be possible once her team had figured out the pesky science. She had never, she claims with unblinking doe eyes, meant to give the impression that the technology she developed “can” already do those things.
In President Clinton’s case, it was pretty clear to even a casual observer that we were watching a man who’d been caught lying about an affair trying to wriggle out on a technicality. With Holmes, something altogether more bizarre is going on.
Her confusion is so sincere and convincing that Fielder begins to wonder whether, as Evans claims, her brain just works differently. In one of the documentary’s bravura scenes, Fielder plays her Abbott and Costello’s famous “Who’s on First?” comedy routine. Although Holmes professes to understand what’s going on, she is apparently genuinely unable to name the batter on first base. As an audience, we’re left wondering: Can one of the most famous convicted fraudsters in America really be this guileless? Or are we witnessing something closer to maximum guile?
Holmes, who has been villainised as a supreme scam artist in the press and in the courts, is not the villain of this film. That role falls squarely to Evans, the father of her two young children.
Early on in the film we see Holmes scrambling eggs in a manner that displeases Evans, and he immediately takes over. The moment foreshadows the many more shocking revelations that are to come about the nature of his relationship with Holmes: that he frequently posts as her on X, that he has built an AI version of her that says whatever he wants it to say, that he has power of attorney over all of her affairs. “I can literally do anything” as Holmes, he tells Fielder.
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Almost as hard to believe is just how sincerely Holmes and Evans appear to be besotted with one another. In prison, Holmes says she wants to build a monument to their love, perfectly echoing something Evans had earlier told Fielder she would say.
Holmes has history here. During her time as CEO at Theranos, Holmes was in a clandestine relationship with her significantly older company president, Sunny Balwani, who was ultimately sentenced to 13 years in prison for his role in the fraud. At trial she portrayed him as the mastermind, accusing him of coercive control as well as rape (both of which he denied). When they were together, she wrote to him in flowery language. According to court documents, Holmes once texted him: “You are the breeze in the desert for me. My water. And ocean. Meant to be only together tiger.” To which Balwani replied: “OK.”
Could it be true that Holmes is as naive as she makes herself appear, and has simply gone from one domineering relationship to another? Fielder probes the idea of Holmes’ culpability when he recreates one of his and A24’s earliest meetings with Holmes and Evans. Having met to discuss the terms of their involvement, Holmes excuses herself to look after the children, at which point Evans successfully negotiates a cut of the proceeds from the film. (A postscript states that he subsequently gave up that right.)
It’s a compelling, complicated moment. Has Holmes orchestrated it so that she’s out of the room, with hands clean? Or has Evans really gone behind her back without her knowledge? Holmes repeatedly claims not to have any interest in money, but isn’t that only really possible if you know someone else is worrying about the messy business of financial realities on your behalf?
Towards the film’s conclusion, while visiting Holmes in prison, Fielder asks directly whether she knew about the deal Evans made when she was out of the room. When he tries to recall her answer, he struggles for the details and we’re back in the realm of semantics. Did she say: “I knew he was talking to you about it”, meaning she knew about the request for money, or the vaguer: “I knew he was talking to you about something”?
By that point, we have started to sense that Fielder has become compromised. He wants to protect Holmes, and to punish Evans. We see old footage of him joining her in the waves off Del Mar: out of his comfort zone, out of his depth. Has she manipulated him? Or is she a fragile, damaged person still being manipulated by those around her? The film is a riddle without an answer, but perhaps there’s a clue in the title. Can you see everything? That depends on what the meaning of the word “can” is.
‘You Can See Everything’ is in US cinemas, and is released in the UK on 20 November
