Enemy of the State Movie Review

Enemy of the State (1998)

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Written by: David Marconi
Directed by: Tony Scott
Starring: Will Smith, Gene Hackman, Jon Voight, Lisa Bonet, Regina King, Barry Pepper, Jake Busey, Scott Caan, Jason Lee, Gabriel Byrne, Jack Black, Jamie Kennedy
Rated: R
Watch the trailer

Plot
A lawyer becomes targeted by a corrupt politician and his N.S.A. goons when he accidentally receives key evidence to a politically motivated crime.
 
Verdict
It's fun but forgettable; a spiritual successor to The Conversation. Will Smith is on the run for most of the movie from the NSA. At the time the surveillance power depicted seemed conspiratorial, but now it just seems quaint. It's an intense movie, but past the frenetic action there isn't much more to this. 
It depends.

Review
This released during peak Will Smith. His previous movies were Independence Day and Men in Black.

This kicks off when an NSA director tries to strong arm a congressman that opposes a counter-terrorism bill. The director takes it too far in trying to convince the politician, but he doesn't realize that the encounter was caught on camera by a biologist.

Due to the NSA's widespread surveillance, they're alerted that a video exists and the owner wants to distribute it. The biologist just happened to record the murder, and he also has all the equipment to copy the file. He's also athletic enough to go on a cross city run trying to elude an NSA pursuit.

While agents chase down the biologist, it just so happens that the biologist runs into his old friend, hot shot lawyer Bobby Dean (Will Smith). The biologist is desperate to escape, but he slips the video into Dean's bag while Dean tries in vain to chat him up.

Gene Hackman, Will Smith play Brill, Bobby Dean

Dean is unaware he possesses the video, but the NSA posing as police question him about it. Dean at this point knows nothing, but the NSA later break into his house to search, staging it as vandalism. Soon the NSA shuts down all his accounts as Dean goes into hiding.

This was such a conspiracy movie, thinking the NSA could spy on everyone with satellites. It seems quaint at this point. Little did we know how much power the NSA had. This movie became closer to reality after the September 11 attacks and the enactment of the Patriot Act. The 2013 revelations by Edward Snowden regarding the NSA surveillance programs revealed this movie was closer to reality than imagined.

The NSA upends Dean's life, but the scary thing is how easy it is to ruin him. With his secrets exposed, his life is over. Luckily for Dean, as a lawyer he has contacts with excellent investigators, one of them Brill (Gene Hackman). Brill has remained anonymous up this point, after having a career in the NSA.

From this point it's a manhunt. The NSA are after Dean and by extension Brill. Of course Dean makes silly mistakes that the NSA capitalize on to locate the pair. It's a high intensity chase for the rest of the movie. The world is slowly closing around him. Who do you trust?

This kind of thriller felt more prevalent in the 90s. A character on the run from an enemy, unable to escape in this new online digital world which makes you easier to track. Dean manages to make a last ditch ploy, setting up a meet with the NSA and a criminal defendant Dean knew through a client.

This is peak Will Smith in an on-the-rails action movie. The questions and conspiracies give this enough of a boost to tip the scales if you have a passing interest.