Remember the Sony Hack? At first it was sort of funny, especially when we learned that even the people who make Adam Sandler movies hate them. Then it got bitchy when we found out the horrible things that Hollywood bigwigs were saying about Angelina Jolie. Then it got nasty when those same bigwigs were making racist jokes about President Obama. Then it got flat-out terrifying and/or farcical when it turned out that the cause of the leak was North Korea. Or maybe it wasn’t. You’ve probably tried hard to forget just how much of a tizzy we got into when we thought that North Korea had used cyber-terrorism to stop the release of The Interview. Sony was going to give in to the threats and never release the movie! Everyone tried to persuade the studio to stand up for Freedom and Democracy. And I mean everyone: when Mitt Romney and George Clooney are on the same page about an issue, you know it’s a strange world. In the end the movie got released, no movie theaters were attacked, and everyone moved on (except Sony’s Amy Pascal, who was fired, sort of).
Well, in step with the current Hollywood trend for repackaging old ideas, the Sony Hack is getting a reboot. WikiLeaks has published 170,000 emails and 30,000 documents from the studio, arguing that things like Tom Hanks’ secret alias “belongs in the public domain.” It’s even added a search function, allowing you to find out how much money Seth Rogen made last year, or why some men might fret about the size of Michael Fassbender’s penis. Sony has condemned WikiLeaks, accusing the whistleblower website of aiding the hackers, reports Variety. “The cyber-attack on Sony Pictures was a malicious criminal act, and we strongly condemn the indexing of stolen employee and other private and privileged information on WikiLeaks. The attackers used the dissemination of stolen information to try to harm SPE and its employees, and now WikiLeaks regrettably is assisting them in that effort.” WikiLeaks’ editor-in-chief Julian Assange argues “This archive shows the inner workings of an influential multinational corporation. It is newsworthy and at the centre of a geo-political conflict. It belongs in the public domain. WikiLeaks will ensure it stays there.” Remember, all of this started because of a movie made by the guys who made the stoner comedy Pineapple Express. And just in case you still haven’t seen The Interview, let me save you the trouble: it’s terrible.
