So I finally decided to watch this movie. It was put together by the peeps behind 2600, about Kevin Mitnick, his supposed hacking feats and his wonderful trip through the US legal system.
Overall, the movie helped fill in a few details of the story that I had not heard, but was a better film for the stories of other individuals that were included in the movie. The backdrop is a cross-country road trip talking to people involved in the story, with a visit to DefCon thrown in. Interspersed are interviews with other hackers and their travails with the justice system. These stories are, in my mind, the highlight of the film. They show the justice system's view towards hackers, and how they are treated.
As some of you may know, I was a phreaker/hacker many a moon ago. At the age of 15, I was busted by the SBI, fined, given community service, taken through Scared Straight, put on probation and made to write a 20-page paper on why what I did was wrong. Oh, and the judge berated me for not having higher grades. That experience soured me on computers for a while. This film, however, put my disappointments and feelings into a much different context. As a minor, they really couldn't do too much to me. The people in this movie, however, are not minors.
One of the strangest things was seeing people with whom I had "associated" in the film. Phiber Optik from MOD, the Cult of the Dead Cow gang. They mentioned LOD, but I don't recall seeing any ex-LOD'ers in the film. If memory serves, they all "sold out" and became security consultants (Ah, a link. The CTO there used to be Doc Holliday of LOD.
Overall, I'd give the film a 7/10. The production quality is a bit low, as you might expect, but the most disturbing aspect was how ill-equipped these people were for their adventure. It just seems to me that if you were planning to track people down and talk to people, you'd plan a little better than they did.