Thirty-four days before Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of the medical testing company Theranos, reported to prison to begin her 11-year sentence for defrauding investors, she invited a camera crew into her rented home in Southern California in an effort to clear her name. Yet the two people she chose to chronicle her life were Nathan Fielder, the absurdist comedian behind “Nathan for You,” and the documentary director Lance Oppenheim....
Two weeks before she leaves for prison, Fielder moves into the home and is there for moments many would consider off limits. There’s also a surprise plot point that shouldn’t be spoiled....
Well, it's the age of AI. I went right to Grok, linked to this article and said I'm "wondering what's the 'surprise plot point' the NYT won't reveal. Go ahead and spoil it for me." I consider myself better off knowing, but I won't reveal it to you either. You can find out for yourself. I prefer not to be distracted by thinking about how there's a giant surprise plot point. They're trying to generate excitement by keeping us in the dark, but we have the power to step into the light. I did, and I'm just fine. Still interested in the movie, but unwilling to see it in the theater. It's 3 hours long! And I don't need to go because I'd be just so damned curious about the plot point. I know the plot point. And my life is still the same. That head-to-head, eyeball-to-eyeball close-up in the trailer is a much bigger deal, and I don't know how much of that you can stand. I found the one minute plenty disturbing. It got the point across. Maybe I should quit while I'm ahead.
ADDED: The close-up is so close-up. I mean, compare it to the famous face-to-face close-ups in cinema history. It makes DeNiro and Pacino seem standoffish:
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81 comments:
Blair witch project for female convicts.
(zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz)
A former news guy for Armstrong and Getty could do a funny Elizabeth Holmes ad lib, deep voice, absurd claim about whatever the topic was, when the scam was still working.
It's pretty scary how far some people can go without self-reflection, or even worse, with it. There is wide variance among us in conscience that leave some of us as siting ducks among wolves.
Her constant head nodding while she's staring at him would have made me ask her if she's got a medical condition.
It sure is creepy how showbiz types love to do "documentaries" on sociopathic swindlers, con-artists, and serial killers. Those fucked up bastards ought to be euthanized for the protection of the rest of us instead of lionized. Fuck Hollywood.
Being in a relationship with her would be like setting up camp in lion's den.
I am interested, but "Bad Blood" by John Carreyrou is a great book about the Holmes saga, so not sure they can top that.. She is a very very strange person and deceived a lot of smart people. Although, she took advantage of the media's intense interest in the "girl power" aspect of her story. They really, really wanted a female Zuckerberg and looked past some glaring red flags to find one.
That was surprisingly creepy.
Mary Beth said...
Her constant head nodding while she's staring at him would have made me ask her if she's got a medical condition.
According to Carreyou, one thing that everyone who met her commented on is that she never blinks.
I think (but of course cannot be sure) that even without our host's introduction, I'd have thought "PSYCHOPATH!"
I think Elizabeth Holmes long sentence is bullshit. Theranos had one of the most impressive boards of insiders that has ever been formed. Did they invest money in the company? Did they financially suffer from its collapse?
I think Holmes was a patsy and a beard.
George Shultz, former US secretary of state
Gary Roughead, a retired US Navy admiral
William Perry, former US secretary of defense
Sam Nunn, a former US senator
James Mattis, a retired US Marine Corps general who went on to serve as President Donald Trump's secretary of defense
Richard Kovacevich, the former CEO of Wells Fargo
Henry Kissinger, former US secretary of state
William Frist, a heart and lung transplant surgeon and former US senator
William H. Foege, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Riley P. Bechtel, chairman of the board of the Bechtel Group Inc.
Some poor guy married that psyco and had children witrh her.
Always = Never
Reminds me of "Obsessed Girlfriend" meme.
Let me guess, Nathan has her child.
And yes, it is disturbing. They are both disturbing.
Having the specific people listed above on the board was one of the red flags. WTF do George Shultz and Sam Nunn know about a start up tech company? Geriatric ex-politicians were on the board for respectability. Not listed was some CFO at a post-IPO tech company. The kind of guy/gal who would say, hey this looks like bullshit.
Also, seeing that a Bad Blood documentary is in pre-production, so this film will be awkward for that. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5795144/
The weirdest thing about her to me was the way she made her voice deeper in any sort of formal situation. Off-time she'd switch back to her normal higher-pitched girl-voice.
But, yeah, as someone else said, people were desperate for La Femme Zuck.
Some rich people commit crimes perhaps because the only reason they ever became rich is that they were habitual criminals from the start. They got away with it until they didn’t, and then were labeled criminals. Elizabeth Holmes and Sam Bankman-Fried being cases in point. Their business models were arguably fraudulent from the get go.
For those interested in fraud theory, the Fraud Diamond Model is a more sophisticated version of the The Fraud Triangle (a model devised by Steve Albrecht) with four factors: Pressure, Opportunity, Rationalization and Capability.
Marianne Jennings' 'Seven Signs of Ethical Collapse' is an excellent model, worth looking at with FTX in mind.
Holmes was barely out of her teens and clearly a troubled person. But that incredibly impressive board propped her up?
Dumb people focus on how weird Elizabeth Holmes is instead of asking who made the money on this scheme.
Holmes was a patsy and a beard.
She did look intense, disturbed, and disturbing. Maybe it was the lighting or maybe the conditions she was under at the time. In any event, she certainly didn't look like the sort of person who could con some of the most sagacious people on planet earth. Bernie Madoff, yes, but not her. Like Jason Arday, the most interesting thing about the story is not her mendacity but how she was able to fool the people who were supposed to spot such obvious liars......Maybe she'll have a more interesting epilogue than Jason Arday. The movie sounds interesting, and I'll probably watch it.
Her wide eyes, her looks, the tilt of her head on key comments, her whole affect here -- all read to me like an open sexual invitation. If she had been raped at a fraternity at Stanford when younger, I can imagine some guy fired up by her apparent come-on and being absolutely convinced he was doing exactly what she wanted. As well as what he wanted.
We do seem to be living in a time when a lot of obvious frauds have prospered for a while but then crashed and burned. Maybe that's a good thing. Maybe a lot of obvious frauds in previous generations prospered and lived out their lives in peace and then passed their wealth onto their children.
That trailer was disturbing. I don't know anything about Fielder. I for one feel thankful she's in prison so she can't harm her child.
“ Some poor guy married that psyco and had children witrh her.”
A little hard not to weep for those two children.
Gender guile.
“Extreme close-up Holmes: "I don't have anything to deceive you on. Of course, I'm not deceiving you. I'm engaging with you as a human being. Why would I deceive you?"”
Anyone who’s seen “The Puppet Masters” would know she’s being controlled by an alien parasite, and she’s getting way too close. Back away slowly, then run.
I don't think it's gender guile. She has the same superficial prettiness as Ilhan Omar, but she's still pretty clearly using it the way a reptile would, to distract and disarm for the opportunity to incapacitate. Her behavior is creepy almost beyond words. His is an attempt at defense, I think. She's thinking he's an easy mark.
Now that she's in jail it seems easy to spot, but she always creeped me out and made me wonder about the supposed wisdom of some of the high-rolling suckers that bought in. For example, how did they ever become high rollers. Makes you think about insider success, and how, exactly, it gets that way.
I wonder if she and Ghislane take long walks together in that luxury compound in downtown Bryan. I wonder what voice she uses, in those settings.
I was going to comment sarcastically that she, as a woman, has no agency and can't be held accountable because it was all Sunny Balwani'# fault leading jet astray. I think she even used that as her legal defense, calling him a Svengali.
I had in mind the child murderer from last week and all the women sympathizing with her
Then I read the comments here and realize that there are smart people who believe she can't be accountable
I'm not saying anything. Sarcasm is Impossible in this instance.
She belongs in jail. But so do the board of direcyord
John Henry
Planned Investorhood
From OED: wile rhymes with guile
wile(n.)
late Old English, wil "deceitful stratagem, crafty trick, sly artifice," a word of uncertain origin; perhaps from Old North French *wile (Old French guile), or directly from a Scandinavian source (compare Old Norse vel "trick, craft, fraud," vela "defraud"). Perhaps ultimately related to Old English wicca "wizard" (see Wicca). Middle English Compendium offers three guesses. Also compare guile. Specifically "deceitful charms," late 14c. (wiles of women). The lighter sense of "amorous or playful trick" is from c. 1600.
The cameras that recorded the close-ups seem to have disappeared for the long shot.
The disturbance created is intentional, dishonest, and manipulative.
Don't be played.
The shaking is from her rocking the baby's cradle with her foot. A Mother's work is never done!
Re her board, some of these guys were clearly past their sell by date. Others had no business being on a board of directors. People think that someone who has run a federal agency or been a cabinet department head can be on a board - maybe of an established company where the GC and Secretary and CFO provide support through training, background etc. (and even then they are mostly in over their heads) but for a tech company in its early stages, no way. They don’t know what questions to ask or what to do.
Drugs? Either or both? Extremely hard to watch.
I was like, "Blink! Blink! Holy shit, you need to blink. Blink!"
She dresses like Steve Jobs because fashion = smart.
The doc I saw already was this one. Watch it and you'll avoid the stock market for a decade.
She looks like an animatronic puppet.
They don’t know what questions to ask or what to do.
The lack of scientists on the board was a big tell. There was no oversight at all. That was intentional.
This woman bilked so-called sophisticated investors out of millions.
She's having hormonal issues and post-prison depression. She's allowed to lie, don't ya know. New rules!
"A little hard not to weep for those two children."
Someone might want to find out what exercise equipment she uses...before someone "weeps".
When Theranos was at its peak, almost everyone I knew who had relevant scientific experience was incredulous and thought it was a scam. I know a Ph.D. who joined the company, thinking that if someone were making such extreme claims, the claims had to be true, since there is no way the company would have progressed so far on lies. He assumed that he would learn about the scientific magic once he signed the non-disclosure agreements. Oh, my sweet summer child. He learned about the magic, but the only science involved was the science of a confidence game.
The identity of the board members was as loud of an alarm bell as I've ever encountered in business. IIRC, there was only one board member who had vaguely relevant expertise. No one else on that board had any business serving on the board of a biotech company.
It's hard to overstate how obvious a scam Theranos was to anyone who did the slightest due diligence. Enron and Bernie Madoff would have been embarrassed to be so blatant. Anyone who lost money investing in Theranos, especially the VCs, deserved to lose it or to do time.
I read GBS's account of his trip to the Soviet Union and his meeting with Stalin. He thought that the Soviet Union was a happy place and Stalin was the greatest guy ever. When people want to believe a lie, they believe the lie and it doesn't much matter who's telling the lie. The scary thing is that she's far from the most blatant liar ever.......Different people buy into different lies. The wish to lie and the wish to believe lies are hard wired into all of us. It's a lie to say that such mendacity and gullibility are exclusively located in one ideology or class whatever and that we, ourselves, are immune from. Someday the Iceman cometh for us all.
Fielder looks like a creep because he is exploiting an extremely vulnerable woman.
Not Fielder's fault. He's having a hormonal emergency. Not exploitation by reason of inanity.
That scene was not part of a documentary. It was scripted and badly acted. Holmes seems like she's trying very hard not to crack up laughing. And yes, a blink or two would be nice.
If an alien entity could fully inhabit human form, I suspect it would appear something like what I saw there from Holmes.
This could be some high level test work going on. I'm open for other explanations.
Zark Muckersporg has been retained to help Elizabeth learn from his mistakes. If anyone can help a fellow lizardian succeed in avoid humanity's uncanny valley where he has failed, it's fellow-human Zark.
Enough prestige can create it's own weather and it's usually a fog. Greed played a big role too, I expect.
I appreciate Holmes for exposing how fucking stupid & pompous the Elite are.
George Schultz grandson was trying to tell him Holmes was full of shit. But George wouldn’t listen because it would mean George Schultz & Friends are Rubes.
A lot of fraud would be impossible if people weren't so easily swayed by appeals to authority. She probably got one famous guy to sign on and then used him to start the dominoes falling as each one was used to fool the next. We've all fallen for it, because when we don't understand the facts well, we trust that someone else does and wouldn't do it if it was dumb, which is dumb.
Believe all Women!
Our civilization has gotten so deep with layers on layers of bullshit, that nobody really understands the repercussion of anything. Even if you went to law school, have an MBA, or are an accountant, most endeavors are so deep with paperwork and legal crap that you are really just hoping you are not being used. Even something simple like buying a house is so full of crap, you end up signing reams of paper you can't possibly understand fully. It's pure faith.
And what's a woman?
If you get greedy, you really put yourself out there on a limb.
I watched it and saw her blink her eyes numerous times. Was I somehow looking at a different video from the rest of you?
If you know Fielder's work at all, the "surprise twist" won't come as a surprise at all, but rather SOP. He's one of the most original comedy talents working today.
As frauds go, she's the superstar. Books, documentaries, TV miniseries, and now this. Her star is very far from being played out. . Bernie Madoff far surpassed her in amount of money grifted, but, so far as I can remember, there was just that one HBO movie. In terms of sheer bullshit and audacity, you've also got to give Jason Arday credit. However, he's got a story that no one wants to touch.......I guess Weinstein wasn't a con man, but he got away with molesting and abusing several generations of movie stars. That's somewhat mind boggling. I don't suppose we'll ever see a movie about his crimes either.
Now that I've watched that trailer, I don't need to see the movie.
I enjoyed Madoffs grift. He let wealthy people believe he was making super returns by insider trading. It shielded them from trading on insider information. They had no problem with getting richer on insider trading as long as they were insulated.
Fuck them. I’m glad he ripped them off.
I watched it and saw her blink her eyes numerous times. Was I somehow looking at a different video from the rest of you?
She starts off blinking like a normal woman and then when she says "I'm always being real," she spirals off into non-blicking, head-bobbing, alien-shit cray-cray. Blink! Blink, psycho!
And he's not blinking for the first part of the trailer. It's a no-blink contest, I swear to God. And then his eyeballs start to bleed and he's like, "Okay, all right," and he's blinking like mad.
Blink or Die: The Movie
I'm just glad she's decided on girl voice now that she's a criminal. "Don't put me in a man prison." I predict her voice is going to get higher and higher.
Crazy as a shit house rat, for sure, and like a moth to an open flame, I want her. It's a good thing I can't have her.
Variety has a great review of the movie that reveals the cinematic surprise.
I will probably watch it at some point. It sounds a lot like Adaptation. It would be funny if Charlie Kaufman came out at the end and said, "I wrote this."
I'm inclined to defend her. I mean, it was only money. She's no Lindsay Clancy. And even Lindsay Clancy has defenders. Lunatics as they may be. LOL.
It must be her spellbinding eyes.
Crazy as a shit house rat, for sure, and like a moth to an open flame, I want her. It's a good thing I can't have her.
"Sleep with you? Oh yeah. Sure. Not a problem. For a second there I thought you wanted me to invest in a stock."
If you never blink, you go blind or die or something. It does look like she isn't blinking for long stretches though. She has crazy eyes, that glassy stare that tells us that she's someone to avoid. She does blink, but it seems as if she doesn't because she doesn't break that glassy-eyed mask. The glassy stare might be taken as indicating that her conversational partner has her fully attention, but it becomes clear that her face is a kind of mask and she's not letting him in at all.
Watch it once more, but with the sound off
The vibe is even creepier. Psychopath.
.
""But that incredibly impressive board propped her up?
Dumb people focus on how weird Elizabeth Holmes is instead of asking who made the money on this scheme....""
Same impressive people could also have been cons themselves??!!//
Worth repeating:
Rabel said...
The cameras that recorded the close-ups seem to have disappeared for the long shot.
The disturbance created is intentional, dishonest, and manipulative.
Don't be played.
The shaking is from her rocking the baby's cradle with her foot. A Mother's work is never done!
9/8/26, 11:40 AM
The guy looks like old school retard.
I counted seven blinks from her in the video.
I can sort of believe that it wasn't a scam from the outset. Holmes was 19, ambitious, and arrogant to the point of overselling her idea and not subjecting it to real scientific scrutiny. Then before she knew it she was in over her head, and the psychopath in her took over, egged on by all those big name non-scientists who jumped aboard for the ride.
Any who Watch Chinese short drama plot with fake daughter vs real>>> Holmes is for real life scheming faker really good.
After being burned on a couple of early investments roughly 15 years ago, I decided to 1) never be a follower, and 2) always do my own diligence. A little later I added: if someone says "its the next google!" I walk away.
So far I'm averaging about double what a good stock portfolio would, but its a ton more work. And you do have to tolerate total losses.
Two of the most successful founders I've encountered were youngish women. They both had experience, and encyclopedic knowledge of their markets and the status of their tech.
Like St. Croix, I read the "Variety" review. He beat me to it, but I also would recommend it if you don't want to go into seeing the documentary "blind," so to speak.
I'd be curious what Grok pointed to for Althouse--not the *content*, which she rightly skipped due to the spoiler factor, but the source itself.
Oh, and I suspect I'll wait to see it until it's streaming. MAYBE if it's in the one movie theater in my community, about 1-1/2 miles away? I dunno.
Jeez, she was seriously tweaking on some kind of drug.
After reading the excellent Bad Blood, why would I be interested in spending any more time on Elizabeth Holmes? Complete cash grab by all parties in my opinion. And the plot twist? A complete snooze.
If you're talking great close-ups in cinema, you better mention the three way standoff climactic gunfight in The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly. Entire character arcs are written in the shifting eyes of the three main characters.
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