An in-depth look at the rise and fall of New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, including interviews with the scandalized, former politician.This is just about the greatest political documentary ever made. Rarely do I give a film more than a 7, but this is pure 10 all the way. Not just covering the sex scandal, this film gives a broader look at Spitzer's career, even touching on his childhood and upbringing. There is plenty on Wall Street, and we get to learn a bit about the call girl industry.Should Spitzer have been taken down? Of course. Having an affair may be excusable, but engaging in a relationship with a prostitute is a crime, and we need to hold attorneys and politicians in higher standing than that. But just because he made this mistake, it should not subtract from the good things he did to help clean up corruption.

If I could give this a zero, I would. I was a fan of Spitzer's early in his purported campaign against Wall Street. As a New Yorker, I had followed his silk purse career from the beginning.What the writer director does here is imply, use innuendo and ultimately avoid the bottom line single issue. Eliot Spitzer hired prostitutes and flew them all over the country, nay, the world, all the while prosecuting the same behavior in others. Worse, he was hiring young women, the same age as his own daughters. A truly sleazy individual.But it goes much farther than that. It totally ignores all of the financial shenanigans of Eliot and his father, which would have derailed any national run for office. His father, one of the largest real estate developers in NY, gifted Eliot numerous apartments which provided most of his multimillion dollar income. His father even paid the gift tax on it.Bernard also loaned Spitzer's campaigns millions of dollars, $5Million +, and worse, made enormous donations to the campaigns of those who were his son's "allies".That is almost unimportant next to the real issues. Spitzer's supposed campaign against Wall Street. In most of the cases that he made sure to hold press conferences when issuing subpoenas, he ended up settling for virtually nothing, or never even pursuing in court.Worse, he lost the most high profile prosecutions he pursued, including the one showcased in the movie against Dick Grasso of the NYSE (never mentioned in the movie that Grasso was vindicated in Federal Court) and was shown to have been nothing more than a personally vindictive, wildly undisciplined attorney general.By his own admission in the film, again, brushed over by the filmmaker, he admits to telephone calls to the people he was pursuing telling them they were 'dead' or going to be 'steamrolled' or "at war". What kind of prosecutor does such things? Ultimately, the director through innuendo and editing, implies that there was a conspiracy to bring Spitzer down. He even uses pro Spitzer talking heads to imply that Spitzer would be the only "John" to be prosecuted under the Mann Act (I guess he never heard of heavyweight champion Jack Johnson) and then immediately quickly brushes past the fact that Spitzer, in fact, was NOT prosecuted. He then again uses a talking head to claim that the entire investigation was a set up simply to leak Spitzer's involvement with the Emperor's Club prostitution service to the NY Times. Huh? The most liberal newspaper in the country, which almost singlehandedly had made his career was now the demon of his destruction? What he completely ignores are the simple facts of the case. There was not a single notice of an illegal transaction noticed by the Feds, but many transactions designed to specifically skirt the federal law that requires ANY cash transaction of $10K or more to be reported (some reports said dozens of such transactions). Spitzer repeatedly made transactions of $5K at a time to pay his $10K/day hooker. The law that was designed primarily to ensnare money launderers as a result of the cocaine wars of the 1980's is what caught him.The size of the this ring, whose owners were sent to federal prison, is demonstrated by the fact that when they were arrested in their apartment, they had more than $1 Million in cash in a safe in their bedroom. This was no small time hooker service, but a major international escort service which included members of the royal family as clients - oh yeah, I guess since THAT came out, it wasn't really an attack just on Spitzer - another fact noted, and whitewashed by the director.Did Spitzer make enemies? Of course. But the idea that Hank Greenberg or Ken Langone brought him down is not only foolish, it's insulting. Were they the ones hiring the hookers? The director also compares Spitzer to fallen pols like Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich and others who engaged in extramarital affairs. As bad as they were, they were NOT committing crimes and certainly NOT at the same time they were specifically empowered to prosecute the very crimes they were committing.That Spitzer has any credibility is a sad reflection of the current state of the body politic.Spitzer is a brilliant individual with an extreme case of narcissistic personality disorder.Had the filmmaker used the forum to dissect the hubris that ultimately brings down so many of these types, he might have added to the conversation.Instead, this film looks like it was bankrolled, as Eliot's whole career was, by his father.

Elliot Spitzer looks dead pan into the camera and says that 'God gives all the power to the men he chooses to destroy'. If you believe in God then by now you know that he is white, rich, a WASP and more than likely a Republican. Because the lengths Spitzers enemies all rich, white, powerful republicans went to destroy Elliot is not humanly possible. The vile and contempt they have for him is only matched by the anger they unleashed on Bill Clinton. While countless Republicans are caught cheating with prostitutes, women, men, interns they seem to walk away with far less damage than there Democratic counterparts. And the simple reason is that Republicans have mastered the art of making morality an issue for Democratic leaders when they barely have any of their own. And the reason for that is the American public. We are such gullible fools that we are willing to crucify Spitzer for his sexual transgression while the rich powerful Republicans plunder, loot and rape our banks and our whole financial system. But we average Americans are so stupid and ignorant that we are more concerned where Spitzers dick has been instead of all his actions of bringing all these wall street crooks to justice. Long before AIG failed Spitzer warned and prosecuted AIG for cooking books. The CEO Greenberg resigned when much like Kenneth Lay of Enron claimed that he had no idea what was going on in his company. He then said to Charlie Rose that his stock was worthless and now only valued at 100 million. These people will never care about the common man. And they will bury any man who takes up the cause of the common man. SPITZER IS TODAY"S ROBINHOOD. So what if he is an outlaw because he banged prostitutes. Let his wife Judge him for that, not some vile greedy rich white men who think they are gods.

A failed 2011 Academy Award hopeful, "Client 9. . ." offers an out-of-balance, sanitized portrait of former NY Governor and current CNN Commentator Elliot Spitzer.Full disclosure: Mr. Spitzer was my otherwise brilliant Governor.Nearly half of this love letter to Spitzer surrounds his White Knight efforts to curb Wall Street greed and malfeasance. According to the Doc, this crusade (and ruffling lots of feathers in the NYS Legislature) allegedly led a nameless enemy to turn him in to the Fed for prosecution. The re-creation of this alleged conspiracy does track and seems possible, but it's beside the point. Mr. Spitzer, in the height of hypocrisy, busted prostitution rings while being serviced by 'Escorts'. When pressed about this aspect of the story, Spitzer sputters and avoids with (paraphrasing) "I'm not going there." Conversely, Spitzer crows effusively about his prosecutorial efforts.Strongly inferred is a theory Spitzer was taken down just prior to the financial collapse and that his continued pressure on Wall Street (particularly against former AIG CEO Hank Greenburg) could have avoided the crash.It's surprising the fallen Gov appeared in this Doc; usually a coup. However, the filmmakers not only handle him with kid gloves, they drift into creating a mildly flattering portrait of a victim of angry enemies bent on his destruction out of a sleazebag who smeared New York's highest office by breaking public trust, spying on and falsely accusing fellow politicians.A comedic high point is the clueless bimbo Cecil Suwal (co-owner of the Emperor's Club Prostitution Ring) who seems unable to grasp the concept of cash for favors and why it's illegal. Joseph Bruno of the NYS Legislature is also unintentionally funny.In several cases actors sit in and mouth the words of the actual parties interviewed off-camera. A novel approach, but why would filmmakers make such a deal? Have the creators never heard of hiding faces and altering voices when someone desires anonymity?Technically, the film, at nearly two hours, is too long by half an hour."Client 9. . ." is reprehensible as journalism. It's cowardly point of view too steeped in avoiding hard questions and treating the subject with undeserved deference. Thus is created a pulpit for Spitzer from which to pontificate. That makes "Client 9. . ." a creamy and soft, uninteresting puff piece instead of a documentary.