Enemies of the State

source: Enemies of the State

I think that it's entirely possible that all the "evidence" against Matt was fabricated by the Govt just to step on him hard as a potential whistle blower. However, Matt's parents went completely off the rails when they chose to pursue the National Security angle over the $ex Charges against him. What turned off both Nashville lawyers is that they wanted to directly focus on the Fed Charges at hand, while the parents were trying to make an end run around them. Had the parents allowed those lawyers to do their job, they may have uncovered that all the "evidence" against Matt was fabricated by analyzing the relevant metadata and Internet transmission logs. The father suggested at some point that such metadata analysis was possible, yet their Grandiose National Security Plan failed and Matt was left with not enough time to do such basic homework and ended up in prison. I am in NO Way saying that the Fed Govt fabricated all that "evidence". I'm only saying that the opportunity to actually prove that was lost with the parents' wrong headed strategy and their obedient son's willingness to go along.

Very crazy story of consipracy to cover another crime. Or was it? Very open to interpretation of what happened. The presentation was pretty good. Nice reinactments using original audio. Overall a good documentary.

This is a cautionary tale of how not to enable bad behavior. These parents love to play victims and everything their son does is perfect. The son was flawed and you failed to help him.

WikiLeaks, 2013, Anonymous posting on a server called The Shell on Tor Network (Deep or Dark Web) ran by Matt (Mathew DeHart). Family applied to Canada in 2014 for asylum. Another example of politicians & government departments not really wanting the population to fully understand what & why we do certain things all in the vague catch-all phrase "National Interest".

I'm trying to watch this, and to a degree it is interesting. However the overlay music is very loud. I'm 25 minutes in and have had to adjust the volume several times just because the music and sound effects are overwhelming. Then you can't hear what people are saying. Very frustrating.

The documentary was overall interesting but heavily laden with actor recreating scenes that were wholly unneeded. In an age where everything is a conspiracy and there are 'heroes' everywhere against a 'shadowy government' this is an interesting look at someone who made such claims to distract from what the government was really trying to charge and prosecute. Beside the dramatic recreations the lack of an interview with the main subject is really to the detriment of the overall documentary. Over produced, over long, could have been edited down to an hour or an hour and a quarter and it may have been bumped up the rating.

Seriously. What did I just spend my time watching? This had all the makings of a great documentary and it absolutely fell apart ..... well, I'm not sure when it fell apart, that's how skillful it was. All I know is, at some some point, I woke up (intellectually) and wondered, "WTF did I just watch?!"

This is a difficult review to write, which makes sense, because it was a difficult film to watch! It was only my stubbornness that kept me watching until the end. And it's a good thing I did, because everything flipped. I grew more and more angry as the first half unfolded. All I could think was "How can so many people be hornswoggled by this horse*&^!?" But keep with it. At the end, if you are a critical thinker and a pragmatist, you'll know who was lying, who was initially fooled but owned up to it, and who was telling the truth all along.

What happened with the reviews here? I was almost shocked by the reviews as I was by some parts of the film... Are people so used to be fed "the truth" with a spoon, that they get angry in the face of ambivalence? Because this was exactly what this film dealt with. Other reviewers here seem to have panned the film because its subject may be a "bad guy". You know you're rating the movie, not Matt DeHart, right? Enemies of the State deals with half-truths, spins, perspectives, the dearth of information and what we as the public make of it all. It deals with it in a subtle way and yes, starting with one perspective and gradually revealing more, while all along the way reminding the viewer that the facts are few, and to be suspicious. By the time it's over, I hope you have made up your mind. This case may be clear by the film's end, but when it comes to other controversies in the news, who do we root for, and who do we vilify?