NEW YORK (AP) — It’s no longer a secret, “You can see everything” Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim Elizabeth Holmes documentary, premiering Wednesday at the New York Film Festival.
Since its debut in a surprise, phone-free screening at the Telluride Film Festival on September 6, “You Can See Everything” immediately transformed into one of the hottest films of the year.
Filmed in secret over three years, the nearly three-hour documentary captures Holmes, founder of the medical testing company Theranos, in the 34 days before he arrived in prison. But as Fielder fans would expect, the way “You Can See Everything” hardly follows a conventional route.
Moviegoers lined up outside Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center as early as 3 a.m. hoping to catch the sold-out 8 p.m. screening.
“You Can See Everything,” which A24 will release on October 16, is a hard-to-believe coda to an absurd saga. Even Fielder isn’t sure what to make of the surreal odyssey he and Oppenheim have captured.
“I’m still having a hard time processing what I went through today,” Fielder said during a question-and-answer session after the screening.
After her conviction on four counts of fraud and conspiracyHolmes entered a Texas prison in May 2023. In a headline-grabbing scandal that has rocked Silicon Valley, one of the most surprising and surreal twists was revealed just this month.
Holmes chose to let Fielder, the absurdist comedian of “Nathan For You” and “The Rehearsal,” and documentarian Oppenheim, intimately film his life with his partner, California hotel heir Billy Evans, and their two children.
At this dramatic time in their lives, Fielder was living in a guest house at their beachfront home in Del Mar, California. The filmmakers shot from morning to evening. Fielder interviews the couple in bed or in the bathroom.
“I mean, I can’t tell you how weird it was that we were there,” Fielder said. “I wouldn’t think I’d be the person you’d want for your last 34 days of freedom. I’m not the most comforting.”
The filmmakers learned that Holmes and Evans had contacted A24 about the prospect of making a documentary. Fielder didn’t initially think it would amount to a feature film, but was simply curious to meet Holmes.
“When I met her, I remember having this strange experience,” Fielder said. “She seems so genuine sometimes, but then I’m like (expletive) and I’m monitoring my thoughts and I’m like, ‘I know she’s a liar.'”
“Everyone who worked on this film was going through a similar cognitive dissonance,” said Oppenheim, who directed the just-released film. “Prime time” starring Robert Pattinson as “To Catch a Predator” host Chris Hansen. “We would unpack the events of the day and no one could agree on the seemingly mundane moments that would occur.”
In “You Can See Everything,” Fielder seeks not only to understand what is true and what is not true about Holmes, but also to address deeper questions of identity, performance, fiction, and control.
Holmes founded Theranos with his then-romantic partner Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani. They promised the company would revolutionize health care with technology that could quickly detect diseases and other health problems with a few drops of blood taken by finger prick.
This hype helped them raise almost $1 billion from investors. In 2014, Theranos was valued at $4.5 billion.
But after the company’s alleged technological advancements were exposed in a series of explosive articles in the Wall Street Journalthe business collapsed. In 2018, the U.S. Department of Justice charged Holmes and Balwani with a litany of white-collar crimes.
Balwani was separately convicted of 12 counts of fraud and conspiracy and sentenced to nearly 13 years in a Southern California prison.
The filmmakers repeatedly asked Alice Tully Hall audiences to preserve the surprising twists and turns the film takes as it moves along. This includes dramatic recreations with the help of an A-list star and other elaborations, all in an effort to get closer to the truth.
But even though Fielder and Oppenheimer pleaded for viewers not to discuss the film in too much detail, they were clearly eager to debate and try to make sense of “You Can See Everything.”
“Every scene happens and we document it. There’s no plan for what’s going to happen next,” Fielder said. “It was a path that opened up for us and we just followed it.”
Gn entert
