The Informant

I think my favorite regular program of any kind is This American Life.  The show is just... they're so good at capturing those moments in life that make you feel warm inside, and those that make a shiver run up your spine.  The modern independent radio story is more or less a carbon copy of the stuff TAL has been doing for years.  If you've never heard their stuff before, go subscribe to their podcast right now.  It's the best thing you'll listen to all week every week, and you can appreciate it while taking a walk.  It's probably the only thing that gets me out and about some weeks.

"But Sam," you say.  "This is a blog about movies!  Why are you talking about a radio show?  Well I think I made it pretty clear in my last post that I'm not above branching out in my subject matter.  There's plenty of stuff out there that acts like a movie but isn't.  To be sure, radio is a step further away from movies than TV is, but it's still in the same spectrum of story-telling.  That's what I'm interested in in the first place - story telling.  It's just that I like forms that get told to me in 2 hours rather than books I have to read over weeks.  I'm from generation X; I'm impatient and easily distracted.

There's more than that, though.  I put on this week's podcast a couple days ago.  It looked like a re-run from nearly a decade ago.  Turns out the show is all devoted to a single story about an FBI informant who helps take down one of the biggest price fixing schemes ever found and rooted out.  More importantly, they reran it this week because a movie version of their 2000 radio story just came out starring Matt Damon.

I remember seeing this poster around and not being excited.  I never even bothered to watch the preview for it on Hulu.  But after hearing the TAL story... well, they get me interested in everything.  The main character is such an interesting guy, and I can easily see Damon playing him really well.  The guy almost reminds me of The Talented Mr Ripley if you replaced the murder with doing illegal business stuff.

Two recommendations then:
1.  Go listen to as much of This American Life as you can get your hands on.  Right now.  Why are you still here?  I know for a fact that this week's show is free, and you can listen to any show for free if you stream if from their website.
2.  Go see The Informant.  I can vouch for the story's quality, as can reviewers (apparently).  It looks like one of those precious few "true stories" that actually remains true to its source material.

Have at it, movie goers!  Before I go, here's an embedded trailer: