“Risk,” Laura Poitras’s film sbout Julian Assange, has been sold to Showtime. The cable network showed a promo for it after the finale of Homeland. More to come.
This is the film we saw in Cannes last year that showed how Assange escaped into the Ecuadorian embassy in London. It also shows him being interviewed by Lady Gaga. Now maybe it will include footage of him shtupping Pamela Anderson on Ecuador’s dime.
I asked several times in the last year what had happened to “Risk.” There was no answer. Then tonight it turned up on the Showtime promo. What a weird way to announce a film.
In Cannes we did get to meet Assange’s weird assortment of cult like followers. One day when he goes to jail perhaps they’ll go with him. Who knows?
What seems to be the case is that there’s no theatrical release for this film. Poitras released “CitizenFour” through Radius-Weinstein and won an Oscar. But the Radius people have vanished, and I guess there were no takers. Still, Showtime can make a big deal of this.
Showtime, by the way, means Les Moonves of CBS approved this. I’m fascinated by Moonves’s interest in progressive politics. Good for him. Waiting for “Homeland” tonight I watched “Circus” and was totally captivated. (But I am sorry about Peter Quinn.)
