The Inventor gives us a glimpse into the inner workings of Theranos, thanks to some internal footage (including promotional material shot by fellow documentarian Errol Morris); CG renderings of the Edison box; and interviews with former Theranos employees, from a receptionist to the head of product development.

The film builds upon WSJ reporter John Carreyrou's book, Bad Blood, which details the company's founding and brief-yet-tumultuous life, but it doesn't unearth anything truly groundbreaking. And even though Holmes' is the star of the story -- with her wide unblinking stare, Jobs-ian black turtleneck and alien speech cadence -- we don't learn much more about her side of the story. The Inventor desperately calls for an on-camera interview with Holmes, where Gibney could have pushed her out of her comfort zone. Unfortunately, she never agreed to one.

Instead, Holmes invited Jessie Deeter, one of the film's producers, to an awkward five-hour dinner. "I was definitely being interviewed, it wasn't going the other way," Deeter said during the media event. "She wouldn't let me take notes and wouldn't let me record the conversation. I'm sure it was recorded one way, for sure. She wanted all the information she could get, she wanted to know who we were talking to and what Alex's questions would be."

During that dinner, Holmes said critics were maligning her because she was a woman, even though men were allowed to fail over and over again in Silicon Valley. When I asked Gibney if she has a bit of point, he was quick to note that Theranos is different than most startups because "she was putting people's' lives at risk." Holmes is held to a higher standard, he said, because she was dealing with human healthcare. Her role as the young genius female founder was also a major reason Theranos attracted plenty of attention early on. "I think it was an inspiring idea," he said. "But when you cross the ethical line having to do with people's health, you can't really hide behind that."

If you've only casually followed the Theranos story, The Inventor has enough juicy tidbits to leave you slack-jawed. How did an unknown health startup with an untested founder get so much support from early investors like Tim Draper? (Spoiler: He was a family friend.) How did Holmes convince the likes of Henry Kissinger and former US Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis to join Theranos' board? How did so many people willingly work for a company where they didn't fully understand its flagship product? The film doesn't answer most of these points, mostly because he never get Holmes' actual point of view, but it's still a fascinating exploration of Silicon Valley privilege and excess.

Holmes wasn't the only notable person Gibney couldn't get on camera. Errol Morris, who shot some slick commercials for Theranos (like the one above), didn't reply to any calls or letters for comment. In the footage Gibney unearthed for The Inventor, Morris's fawning and loving treatment of Holmes looks laughably naive today. When the two ran into each other during an industry event, Morris firmly refused to talk about Theranos and told Gibney "you can't make me." Even going off the record was too much. "For God, there is no off the record, and he can be a very unforgiving person," Morris said.

In the end, Gibney couldn't quite let go of the connection between Elizabeth Holmes and Steve Jobs. "The one lesson she never took from Jobs was what he learned from his biggest failure," he said. The re-invented "Steve Jobs 2.0" surrounded himself with people like Avi Tevanian, who served as Apple's chief software technology officer; Jon Rubenstein [former Apple hardware head]; and superstar designer Jony Ives. "Those people were great at what they did and they could also tell Steve Jobs no. They were kind of a feedback loop. And I think he learned to listen in ways that are constructive, it's incredibly valuable. But that's not a lesson Elizabeth learned."