Sundance. Secrecy.

"This is a strong, probing essay that asks necessary questions," writes the Boston Globe's Wesley Morris, offering a quick take on Secrecy. "Its biggest intellectual shortcoming is that, while the movie has no shortage of proof of how secrecy is corrosive, it provides little positive evidence to support the assertion that more transparency is ultimately better for us. Regardless, it's a movie worth talking about."

Updated through 1/26.

"Directors Peter Galison and Robb Moss don't attempt to hide their belief that the US's government's increasing obsession with classification does more harm than good, and is being used today primarily as a means for the executive branch to avoid accountability," writes Mike D'Angelo for ScreenGrab. "To their credit, however, they also give ample screen time to former CIA and NSA employees, who make a strong case for the opposing viewpoint - so strong, in fact, that I left the movie feeling as if the problem might be inherently insoluble."

"Galison and Moss have found a group of well-spoken people on both sides of the classify/don't classify argument, and listening to them explain themselves is both enlightening and entertaining," writes Noel Murray at the AV Club.

Galison and Moss introduce their film to Filmmaker readers.

IndieWIRE interviews Galison.

Update, 1/26: "The film's a balanced polemic (no, that's not a paradox) about our government's rapidly growing fetish for hiding information from its citizens; you can actually feel the movie focusing your understanding of the issues as you watch," rites the Boston Globe's Ty Burr.

Posted by dwhudson at January 22, 2008 1:23 PM