HBO's Elizabeth Holmes/Theranos film is an ordinary documentary about an extraordinary crime

The Guardian

In The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley, Alex Gibney "finds himself unable to show why Holmes was such a compelling figure," says Hubert Adjei-Kontoh. "Instead, the viewer is lost in an endless maze of dry re-enactments and footage from Theranos promos and interviews. There are some fantastic gets, like early investor Bill Draper who doesn’t believe that the fact he was family friends with Holmes had anything to do with his choice to fund Theranos, but there’s nothing like an actual thesis here. We are overwhelmed with data, often clumsily conveyed. In one scene, Gibney overlays an article about Theranos on still images of a laboratory, a completely un-cinematic way of sharing information that the film returns to again and again. Therefore, though Holmes hovers over the film, we learn very little about her." He adds: "Admittedly, Holmes is a rather laconic and reserved figure but it still would have been possible for Gibney to construct a more purposeful portrait of her. Instead of fatuous comparisons to Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, he could have utilized more recent Silicon Valley schemes, such as the Juicero startup, as vital foils for Theranos."

ALSO:

• Alex Gibney doesn't dig deep enough into Holmes as a person, which is the crucial part of understanding this scam
• What The Inventor does effectively is remind viewers to reconsider our portrait of scammers
• This material is too rich for a single documentary -- it could have benefited from a limited series treatment
• Gibney recalls the trouble getting footage early on due to the potential of lawsuits