‘The Six Billion Dollar Man’ review: Julian Assange is the ultimate whistleblower in Eugene Jarecki doc

Dir: Eugene Jarecki. US/Germany/France. 2025. 123mins

Is Julian Assange a crusading impartial journalist or a harmful menace to nationwide safety? The Six Billion Greenback Man argues for the previous, viewing the Australian WikiLeaks founder as a champion for data in a world during which governments attempt to hide the reality. Eugene Jarecki’s documentary offers a complete overview of Assange’s rise to prominence and US makes an attempt to prosecute him for publishing confidential army supplies. However the movie in the end works higher as a conversation-starter concerning the freedom of the press than as a layered portrait of the controversial activist.

By no means provides its fascinating topic the close-up he deserves

Initially deliberate for a Sundance premiere, The Six Billion Greenback Man was pulled in December by Jarecki, who cited “important latest and surprising developments” within the story that required him to rethink the ultimate work. Now enjoying in Cannes as a Particular Screening, the movie (like fellow competition entry, Raoul Peck documentary Orwell : 2 + 2 = 5) ought to provoke curiosity amongst politically-minded audiences incensed by the shortage of presidency transparency.

That is one among a number of movies about Asssange and WikiLeaks, together with Alex Gibney’s 2013 documentary We Steal Secrets and techniques and biopic The Fifth Property, launched the identical yr. Right here, Jarecki focuses largely on Assange’s media organisation, retracing WikiLeaks’ historical past of working with nameless sources who had labeled data on, for example, US army struggle crimes through the occupation of Iraq, and secret US diplomatic cables that illustrated the nation’s makes an attempt to undermine democracy in sure areas of the planet. By 2010, Assange was a trigger celebre amongst journalists, whereas incomes the ire of the Obama and, later, the Trump administrations. Simply two years later, Assange discovered himself in search of asylum within the Ecuadorian embassy in London, fearing extradition to Sweden on rape expenses which could lead to one other extradition to America for violating the Espionage Act.

Jarecki’s most notable documentaries — Why We Combat and The Home I Reside In — criticised, respectively, America’s army and penitentiary programs, and his newest may be seen as a condemnation of the federal government’s willingness to misinform its residents. The Six Billion Greenback Man leaves little room for debate concerning the ethics of WikiLeaks’ publishing of delicate data, insisting that, so long as the organisation follows journalistic requirements, the significance of teaching readers outweighs the army’s want for secrecy.

If the movie takes that argument as a given, it additionally slightly rapidly recaps and strikes previous a 2010 rape allegation in opposition to Assange made by Swedish police on behalf of two of his sexual companions. (Assange denied the allegations, and in 2019 prosecutors dropped their investigation.) We hear just a few speaking heads check with Assange as a sophisticated, imperfect particular person however whereas The Six Billion Greenback Man is much from a hagiography, it not often delves into his internal life or his motivations. Partly, this is because of the truth that, for a lot of the 5 years Jarecki spent engaged on the documentary, Assange was detained in London’s Belmarsh Jail (he was ultimately launched as a part of a plea deal in 2024). However nonetheless, there’s a disappointing lack of curiosity about Assange himself, which robs the movie of a compelling emotional core.

Much more persuasive is Jarecki’s overview of how the US tried to (metaphorically) get rid of Assange, though we do hear about Trump’s suggestion that they merely kill him. The documentary factors out the irony that when WikiLeaks uncovered unethical or illegal behaviour by the American army in Iraq, the US authorities’s response was to not examine the wrongdoing however, slightly, go after Assange and the informants for telling the reality. The Six Billion Greenback Man’s wealth of speaking heads — together with journalists Naomi Klein, Chris Hedges and Jeremy Scahill, to not point out whistleblower Edward Snowden — create essential context for the importance of such leaks, suggesting that each of the US’s political events are equally invested in shielding its actions from the general public.

As stunning as a few of WikiLeaks’ bombshells have been, the documentary’s most upsetting materials issues closed-circuit footage of Assange’s seven years in London’s Ecuadorian embassy, during which he mainly lived like a prisoner who couldn’t go exterior lest he be arrested in reference to the rape allegations. Even right here, although, he’s however a distant determine — an enigmatic particular person we observe however by no means actually know. It’s ironic that, for a movie concerning the worry of fixed surveillance, the erosion of fact and the eradication of privateness, The Six Billion Greenback Man by no means provides its fascinating topic the close-up he deserves.