In a world where Lindsay Clancy can inspire an onslaught of sympathetic voyeuristic fascination, why not Elizabeth Holmes? Earlier tonight, the screening of an unannounced mystery movie at the Telluride Film Festival generated every bit as much pre-screening buzz as any of the major titles programmed here. And when the movie was revealed to be “You Can See Everything,” a 174-minute documentary, co-directed by the cult comedian Nathan Fielder, about Elizabeth Holmes, the former CEO of Theranos who is now serving an 11-year prison sentence after being convicted of defrauding her investors, the sensation of “WTF? I’ve got to watch this!” did not subside as the movie went on. It only intensified.
“You Can See Everything” is just about the furthest thing from a “pure” documentary you’ve ever seen. That’s part of its appeal — it’s a one-of-a-kind reality-TV-as-hangout-movie psychodrama circus. Yet it’s been made with a spirit of true inquiry, driven by Fielder’s acidly quizzical personality (as an onscreen interviewer, he’s got the most drop-dead deadpan since Steven Wright), and it gets its hooks in you.
Fielder isn’t here to throw open the question of Elizabeth Holmes’ guilt. He wants to know what made her tick. But why, you may ask, is the comedian behind shows like “The Curse” and “The Rehearsal” making a three-hour movie about the woman who became America’s youngest self-made female billionaire by convincing the world that she’d created a revolutionary new means of blood testing? Holmes, after her conviction, stayed out of the public eye, but shortly before her prison sentence was set to begin she decided she wanted someone to document her last days of freedom. Maybe she wanted to have her say?
