CBC The Fifth Estate - The Strange World of Julian Assange (2013)

Some have called for his assassination; still others have called him an angel. Either way, almost everyone has an opinion on Julian Assange. And now the story of his rise as the head of one of the more prolific whistle blowing organizations ever is getting the Hollywood treatment.

The feature film “The Fifth Estate,” starring Benedict Cumberbatch as a sometimes callous but always complicated Julian Assange, tells the story of WikiLeaks from its early obscurity to near world domination and eventual decline. Inevitably, the script for the film was leaked to Assange and WikiLeaks and they were not happy with what they read, posting an open letter response to the film.

We sent a team from the real fifth estate to London where Assange is now holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy hiding from what he says is certain extradition to the U.S. dressed up as a rape charge in Sweden. We got the real story behind why more people are embracing whistle blowing because technology makes it possible and because for them, keeping governments and corporations honest, makes it necessary.

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