NEW YORK – Not unexpectedly given the subject matter, HBO's two-part documentary “The Crime of the Century” opens with a body bag.
It contained a man from San Diego — his remains carried away in the predawn hours after overdosing on fentanyl — one of nearly a half million Americans to die from opioid abuse since 2001.
Filmmaker Alex Gibney quickly widens the lens, however, for an explanation of how the drugs that caused the crisis came to be, how companies aggressively promoted and distributed them and how the government failed to act swiftly and effectively to save lives.
The story is exhaustive and often sickening, its scope recalling the examinations Gibney and his team have given in the past to Enron, to scientology and, most recently,