Actor Benedict Cumberbatch recently wrote a letter to Julian Assange in an attempt to reach out to the WikiLeaks founder, who he portrays in the new film The Fifth Estate. Now, after seeing the film, it appears that Assange will not be meeting Cumberbatch any time soon. The movie, based on the book Inside WikiLeaks: My Time With Julian Assange and the World’s Most Dangerous Website, by Daniel Domscheit-Berg, tells the story of the rise of the controversial website and its equally controversial leader. Now, Assange has responded, ironically leaking his own letter to Cumberbatch. Evidently, Assange did like the film:
This film is going to bury good people doing good work, at exactly the time that the state is coming down on their heads … You will be used, as a hired gun, to assume the appearance of the truth in order to assassinate it. To present me as someone morally compromised and to place me in a falsified history. To create a work, not of fiction, but of debased truth.
He went on to accuse the movie’s studio, Dreamworks, of having ties to the U.S. government and claims they have conspired together to besmirch his organization. Claiming the actor has played “into the hands of people who are out to remove me and WikiLeaks from the world,” Assange requests that Cumberbatch reconsiders his involvement with the film. It does not appear that Cumberbatch, who is actively promoting the movie, has any intention of distancing himself from The Fifth Estate. If anything, Assange has created even more buzz for the movie by leaking such a paranoid-sounding, open letter rant …
