Kill the Messenger
Kill the Messenger is a 2014 American biographical crime thriller film directed by Michael Cuesta and written by Peter Landesman. It is based on the book of the same name by Nick Schou and the book Dark Alliance by Gary Webb. The film stars Jeremy Renner, who also produced the film. The film was released on October 10, 2014, and depicts a reporter's suppressed attempts to cover the CIA involvement and secret support of large scale cocaine sales to fund the Nicaraguan Contras.
Plot
In 1996, San Jose Mercury News reporter Gary Webb interviews drug dealer Ronny Quail, who is outraged that the government used civil asset forfeiture to keep his house even after he was acquitted. Webb's ensuing article about the abuses of forfeiture garners repeated phone calls from a woman named Coral, whom he agrees to meet when she says she has documents that prove the government sponsored cocaine sales in the U.S. Coral gives Webb a transcript of grand jury testimony (normally kept secret) which was accidentally released to her boyfriend, an accused drug dealer, during discovery. After Webb reveals to the prosecutor in the case that he has the transcript, the government drops the charges against Coral's boyfriend in order to protect their main witness: Oscar Danilo Blandón.
Cast
- Andy García
- Barry Pepper
- Brett Rice
- Dan Futterman
- E. Roger Mitchell
- Gil Bellows
- Jena Sims
- Jeremy Renner
- Jimmy Carter
- John Kerry
- Joshua Close
- Lucas Hedges
- Mary Elizabeth Winstead
- Matt Lintz
- Michael K. Williams
- Michael Sheen
- Oliver Platt
- Paz Vega
- Ray Liotta
- Rhoda Griffis
- Richard Nixon
- Richard Schiff
- Robert Patrick
- Robert Pralgo
- Rosemarie DeWitt
- Steve Coulter
- Susan Walters
- Tim Blake Nelson
- Yul Vazquez