The policy crowd got a look at Laura Poitras’s “Citizenfour,” the new documentary about Edward J. Snowden, when it screened in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday.
The film had been shown earlier to a film festival crowd in New York and to movie buffs and some Oscar voters in Los Angeles. But the Wednesday audience in Washington’s Landmark E Street Cinema leaned toward those who are deep in the debate about government monitoring of private communications. Among the viewers were representatives of the Project on Government Oversight, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Government Accountability Project and the Center for Democracy & Technology, according to a spokeswoman for Radius TWC, which is distributing the film.
Mr. Snowden, who is wanted by the United States government, remains in Russia. But William Binney, another whistleblower featured in “Citizenfour,” was on hand, as was Ms. Poitras, who was interviewed by Dana Priest of The Washington Post.
To date, “Citizenfour,” which opens in a handful of cities on Friday, has emerged as the most politically provocative of the films in Hollywood’s annual film awards race.