At first I also considered the latter, but I didn't think it was a failure. The director may want to make the meaning of the film as ambiguous as life itself through such a treatment, and the seemingly noble behavior hides the selfishness of human nature. But after rewatching several key plots repeatedly, I finally lean towards the former, believing that the ending is a sublimation of the finishing touch.
Why are the audiences prone to disagreements on the ending? It may be that they missed some small information in the film. The core question is how many intelligence people does Rachel have?
There are two explanations about this in the film:
The first part is at 4 minutes and 30 seconds in the movie. When the newspaper's legal adviser wanted to learn about Rachel's intelligence man, the newspaper's black female editor-in-chief Bonnie made an explanation: we have two confirming sources. Rachel told me who they are, and I'm comfortable with them. We have Van Doren's letter to the CIA director that the Feds gave to Rachel. That's enough to go to press. Yes, we have a letter from Van Doren to the director of the CIA, which was provided to Rachel by FBI insiders. This is enough for reporting.) In other words, Rachel told the newspaper editor of two intelligence agents. There is no doubt about this, so it was decided to publish the news. The two intelligence agents neither included Stan, the Vice President’s Chief of Staff, nor Allison, the daughter of female agent Van Doren. They are an FBI internal informant (provided a copy of Van Doren's report) and a confirmer (identity is not disclosed in the film). These two intelligence men do not appear in the entire movie, so they are easily ignored by the audience.
The second place is at 38 minutes and 40 seconds in the movie. When the defense lawyer Albert went to the newspaper to ask how many people knew the name of the informant, the legal counsel of the newspaper explained: We know the corroborating source. Well, Bonnie does, anyway, and one of Rachel's sources at the FBI gave us a copy of Van Doren's report. (We know the verifier, Bonnie knows. And one of Rachel's sources at the FBI gave us a copy of Van Doren's report.) Albert further asked. Why there is no name of the original informant? Boninie, the editor-in-chief of the newspaper, said: Well, for one thing, Rachel agreed to complete confidentiality, and because her story was confirmed, it wasn't necessary to know. Absolutely confidential. Secondly, her story has been verified, and there is no need to know the source of the information.) Boninie's so-called verification is the FBI internal informant and news verifier who gave her name through Rachel.
It can be seen that Rachel’s news report was completed after multiple investigations and evidence collection. There are at least three adult intelligence personnel’s information mutually corroborated (including her vice presidential adviser Stan, who did not want to be named, and the FBI who has disclosed it to the editor-in-chief. Internal informants and unidentified news verifiers), rigorous and standardized, as the editor-in-chief Boninie said, Rock solid-as solid as a rock. Even saying that the source of the news is Allison will not reduce the value of this report or Rachel's reputation as a reporter. So Rachel was shot and killed in Van Doren. The reason Stan insisted on being tight-lipped after showing up was simple. He wanted to protect Allison's life. The film also explained it at 1 hour and 14 minutes. Rachel explained to Albert: My source will be publicly saddled with the death of Erica Van Doren,and that, I promise you, will mean the destruction of the person we're talking about It means the collapse of the person we are talking about.)
Why doesn't the film explain whether the other two adult intelligence agents were tracked down? I guess one is that their behavior is not enough to threaten national security, or that the US law clearly guarantees the reporter's right to remain silent about this, and the other is that the director has made a choice to highlight the main plot. Dubois, as the special prosecutor responsible for investigating the breach of Erica Van Doren’s identity, has a very clear goal, that is, to find the intelligence agent who leaked Van Doren’s identity and bring him to justice, because he violated the 1982 "Intelligence Personnel Identity Protection Act" . As for which FBI personnel leaked a copy of the report, or Stan's motivation to provide Rachel with Van Doren's identity, he didn't care.
Finally, why is it that the director’s design of the source of the message as Allison is the finishing touch? In my understanding, there are two good points: First, this is closer to life. Isn’t this often the case in the real world? The so-called truth you try to guess is often so simple that it becomes a blind spot. Imagine that the only intersection between Rachel and Van Doren's lives is that the children are in the same school. If the two of them have never had a direct relationship, then the only thing left is the children. Unfortunately, it is not a possibility in the adult world. Second, it transcends life. When we learned that Allison was the source of the news, our feelings for Rachel became complicated: puzzled, worthless and even suspicious, because she was not without retreat. However, it is precisely because Rachel made the one that ordinary people would not or incomprehensible when faced with the choice, she became more and more moving. Didn't Socrates or Tan Sitong both choose to live toward death when they could have retired? From this perspective, Rachel, like them, transcends life.
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