This is a movie about horrible corporations and the people that run them. They are featured as the enemy that this lonely group of anarchist freegans is valiantly fighting. The writers allow for a certain amount of moral ambiguity when it comes to some of the decisions that this group makes, but it becomes clear that they all have a personal stake in hurting the corporations, and their personal fight has simply coalesced into this righteous indignation.
The reason I watched this movie at all is because Alexander Skarsgård was in it. I really liked him as Eric in True Blood, and I hoped he would bring his bravado and swagger to this role. This is a very different character, however, and he is generally shy and withdrawn through the whole movie. He is the leader of this very small... I'm going to go with cult here, but they don't talk much about religion.
His number one stooge is Ellen Page. As far as I can tell, Ellen plays a caricature of herself. I mean, she's already basically a prettier, younger version of Janeane Garofalo in real life, and this character is little more than her taken to the extreme. She hates all corporations with a passion, she's generally unlikable, and she has a certain bitchy attitude that makes you want her character to shut the hell up.
Into this band of miscreants comes the blonde Brit Marling. She is employed by another corporation whose sole job is to protect their clients from bad market disasters like the ones that the group causes. The group, calling themselves The East, reluctantly welcome her as a fellow person fighting against the grain. They start to include her in their plans, and she has a crisis of conscience over what she is doing.
Direction was okay.
Acting was better in some spots than others.
Story was pretty bad.
Dialogue was bad.
The movie was bad.
.75/5