The MPA cited both graphic nudity and language for Nathan Fielder's Theranos film, a rating that has trailer-watchers speculating about what exactly made the cut.
The Elizabeth Holmes documentary nobody saw coming just got a rating nobody expected either.
"You Can See Everything," the Nathan Fielder project on the disgraced Theranos founder, has been slapped with an R by the Motion Picture Association, per FilmRatings.com. The reason: "some graphic nudity" and "language." For a documentary, that's an unusual combination, and the internet noticed within hours.
The film opens in theaters on October 16, co-directed by Fielder and Lance Oppenheim, the filmmaker behind "Primetime." It first surfaced publicly at the Telluride Film Festival last month after being kept almost entirely under wraps during production.
What's drawn most of the attention so far isn't the rating itself but the trailer that preceded it. In the clip, Holmes sits inches from Fielder's face, unblinking, denying she ever set out to deceive anyone. "I'm not that person," she tells him. "I don't have anything to deceive you on. Of course, I'm not deceiving you." When Fielder presses, half-joking, "You're being real right now?" she answers flatly, "I'm always being real."
That footage was shot in the weeks before Holmes reported to Federal Prison Camp in Bryan, Texas, in May 2023, where she continues to serve time following her conviction on wire fraud and conspiracy charges tied to Theranos. Fielder reportedly moved in with Holmes and her family in San Diego that year to make the film, spending extended time inside her household before she began serving her sentence.
The nudity question nobody's answered yet
With no plot details released about what the graphic nudity actually involves, social media has filled the gap with theories. One Reddit user guessed it might show Holmes giving birth, a nod to her second child, born before she reported to prison. Another, going by rating patterns of recent years, argued that "whenever the rating has the graphic nudity warning, it's most likely male." Someone else simply pointed at the title and shrugged. On X, the reaction ranged from disbelief — "I've never heard of a documentary getting an R rating", to a line straight out of the trailer itself, repurposed as a punchline: "Why would I deceive you? There's no reason for me to do that... Slowly undresses."
Holmes, 42, shares son William, 5, and daughter Invicta, 3, with partner Billy Evans. Neither Fielder's team nor MPA has offered further detail on what specifically triggered the rating, and the studio hasn't confirmed or denied any of the online guesses.
What's clear is that the mystery is doing the marketing for them. Whether "You Can See Everything" earns its rating through something as mundane as the birth footage or something else entirely will only be settled when it actually opens on October 16. Three weeks out, and counting.
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