Disclosure (1994)

Michael Douglas (yes, him again) and Demi Moore star in this corporate thriller focusing on sexual harassment, power and gender dynamics, with a bit of corporate espionage thrown in for good measure.

Tom Sanders (Douglas) is a rising executive at a Seattle-based company, Digital Communications (DigiCom), which is close to completing a merger with a publishing conglomerate.

Sanders has several reasons to see the merger succeed. He expects to be named head of his division and would be in line for lucrative stock options when the deal goes public.

When he shows up for work, however, he gets some unpleasant news. His company has promoted someone else to head the new division. That someone is a woman named Meredith Johnson (Moore), a former lover of Sanders.

Meredith is not the best candidate for the job, but she is the protege of the company’s founder, Bob Garvin, a slick corporate hustler played by Donald Sutherland. There is the inference that she slept her way to the top.

While Sanders tries to swallow his disappointment and tell his co-workers that everything will work out, he accepts Miss Johnson’s invitation for an after-work conference.  She quickly dispenses with the business aspect of the meeting and tries to rekindle the past.

The central sex sequence is simultaneously awkward and enticing, but when Sanders – now married with children – calls a halt to the action, his former lover goes into a rage.

The next day, Sanders is told that Miss Johnson has complained that she was sexually harassed by Sanders. The company will keep it quiet if he accepts a transfer to another division in a different state.

Sanders, however, has learned that the division is about to be sold and decides to fight the harassment complaint.

Stereotypes abound: the beautiful stop-at-nothing female executive; the naive male worker who has been with the company during its early years and now expects some rewards; a boss and company that are trying to show they are ready to enhance the role of women in business, even if good managers are tossed aside in the process.

Sanders’ attorney, Catherine Alvarez (Roma Maffia), says, “Sexual harassment is about power, and so is the company’s resistance to dealing with it. Power protects power. And once a woman gets up in the power structure, she’ll be protected by the structure, the same as a man . . . power is neither male nor female”.

Sanders begins to dig up enough information to help him in his battle, but his memory is slow to connect various facts that could swing the complaint in his favour.

Based on a novel by Michael Crichton, this is an interesting film with complex ideas that never truly resolve. The litigation is only slightly more ludicrous than what plays like a tacked-on ending.

Tom Sanders
Michael Douglas
Meredith Johnson
Demi Moore
Bob Garvin
Donald Sutherland
Susan Hendler
Caroline Goodall
Catherine Alvarez
Roma Maffia
Philip Blackburn
Dylan Baker
Stephanie Kaplan
Rosemary Forsyth
Mark Lewyn
Dennis Miller
Mary Anne Hunter
Suzie Plakson
Don Cherry
Nicholas Sadler
Cindy Chang
Jacqueline Kim
John Conley Jr
Joe Urla
Stephen Chase
Michael Chieffo
Furillo 
Joseph Attanasio
Eliza Sanders
Faryn Einhorn
Matt Sanders
Trevor Einhorn
Ben Heller
Allan Rich
Judge Barbara Murphy
Kate Williamson
Arthur Kahn
Michael Laskin
Chance Geer
Donal Logue
Fred Price
Jack Shearer
Adele Lewyn
Farrah Forke
Chau-Minh
Kim Tran
John Levin
Pat Asanti
Mrs Ross
Marie Rowe
John Conley Sr.
Edward Power
Spencer Kaplan
David Drew Gallagher
Mohammed Jafar (voice)
Jesse Dizon
Computer (voice)
Linda McCullough

Director
Barry Levinson

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