Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal (2021)
1h 40m | PG-13
An examination that goes beyond the celebrity-driven headlines and dives into the methods used by Rick Singer, the man at the center of the shocking 2019 college admissions scandal, to persuade his wealthy clients to cheat an educational system already designed to benefit the privileged.
Director: Chris Smith
Studio: Library Films
Genre: Documentary, Crime, Drama
Video: 720p
Cast
Matthew Modine
as Rick Singer
Roger Rignack
as John B. Wilson
Jillian Peterson
as Lead FBI Agent
Courtney Rackley
as Jane Buckingham
Wallace Langham
as Gordon Caplan
Josh Stamberg
as Bill McGlashan
Reviews
If you've read the news articles about this story, there's not much that this film will reveal to you. Mostly an inoffensive dramatization of what's already been reported. One thing I did take issue with is the way that the piece basically promoted tracking down and searching for the defendants -- it felt like for every single parent, they had a shot of someone typing in their name into Google and looking at some images. Kinda weird.
I guess this is a good character study of some variation of a psychopath, who lies, cheats, throw people under the bus — whatever it takes to advance their own interests. And the movie provides a peek into how the wealthy care about having the best of everything and knowing they can throw money at any problem to solve them. Of course, none of these people are presented in a way to make you root for them in any way, so in the end though I thought it was marginally interesting, I thought it was way too long.