Word: filming
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...long as these differences help to make a better film, without sacrificing the essence of the figures involved, then they should be tolerated. But trying to fit real people into a "protagonist" or "antagonist" mold usually does mean tampering with the facts, and can portray people unfairly. Although Wigand and Bergman do not mind that their characterizations were altered for the film, the crew at "60 Minutes" have had a very different reaction...
...Mike Wallace, who has not yet seen the film, is especially touchy about his portrayal on-screen. He is afraid of being distorted, of having his reputation damaged by Mann's film or of being made out as the "bad guy" of the story. If Wallace is worried about looking bad in the film, he has little to worry about; although his character does waver, for understandable reasons, he ultimately decides to support Bergman and put the interview on. In the film, Wallace is an intriguing, human, and very sympathetic character; he is not without flaws, but despite this...
...what if Mann, for dramatic emphasis in the film, had decided to make Wallace and Hewitt look as amoral and unsympathetic as possible, thus completely misrepresenting their characters? Does Mann have more of an obligation to creating his art or of representing the figures and events involved in a fair and factual...
...Mann has certain responsibilities as a filmmaker, but he also has the right to tell a story; it is his decision on how to balance the obligations of fact and fiction, and hopefully he will respect the powers of each. "Wallace and Hewitt have criticized the film because it's Michael Mann's view of my perspective, or Wigand's perspective," Bergman says. Luckily, Mann, even with the dramatic license he takes, is still committed to telling the true story; but what if the next filmmaker who comes along decides to sacrifice fact for fiction's sake...
...about the boundaries between reality and fiction, and while there may not be rules about how to represent the truth, perhaps there should be responsibilities. In light of this, perhaps The Insider is being misrepresented as a "true" account; it might be more befitting of Mann to market his film as a kind of "historical fiction" than as the real thing...