You Can See Everything is about Elizabeth Holmes and it’s also not about Elizabeth Holmes

These are the established facts in the Elizabeth Holmes case.

The American entrepreneur dropped out of Stanford University at the age of 19 to found the biotech company Theranos, which was supposed to disrupt blood testing. She claimed Theranos’s revolutionary technology would be able to use a single drop of blood, rather than a vial, to make a raft of diagnoses and for a fraction of the cost.

From 2003 to 2016, she raised close to a billion US dollars from investors, which led to Theranos’ evaluation at $US9 billion. Holmes was named the youngest female self-made billionaire, and feted by Silicon Valley and beyond.

The technology didn’t work, it never worked, and she and chief financial officer Sunny Balwani were convicted for fraud, and are now both serving prison sentences.

That’s what we know.

Everything else is up for litigation.

For someone who’s been the subject of wide coverage in the media, and through specialised projects including the drama series The Dropout, the Alex Gibney documentary feature The Inventor, and the non-fiction book Bad Blood, Holmes remains an elusive figure.

Even more so now that the mercurial filmmaker Nathan Fielder has waded in with his three-hour documentary You Can See Everything, a movie as wild and obscure as the woman at the centre of the story.

What you’ve heard about You Can See Everything is true. It is a bonkers ride, a work of mind-f—kery that raises more questions than it answers. It’s entertaining and captivating (the three hours just flies by), and best experienced with a crowd because the collective reactions, the laughs and the gasps, add another layer to the spectacle.

It is one of the best films of the year, a stunning achievement in complex storytelling which breaks down why – and how – we tell stories.

So, while You Can See Everything is ostensibly about Holmes, it’s also not about Holmes. It’s about something larger, about construction and reality, and deception and performance.

You Can See Everything is structured into two halves. The first is centred on Fielder, Holmes and her husband Billy Evans in the 34 days before she has to report to prison. The couple have invited him into their rented home on the beach in San Diego, even offering him the bare mattress in the guest room.

These scenes of domesticity – walking along the shore with Holmes and her family, which includes a toddler and a newborn, cooking breakfast, and a nude shower scene (and we mean nuuuude) that was Billy’s idea – are supposed to humanise Holmes. At least that’s Billy’s stated intention.

Through on-camera interviews with Fielder, an interrogator with a ferocity his Canadian softness belies, it’s clear Holmes still does not believe she did anything wrong. She even claims to never lie, ever, an extraordinary statement from a convicted fraudster.

With her doll-like face anchored by those wide, unblinking eyes, Holmes comes across as sincere, but Fielder’s scepticism pulls you out of any spell. So, is she a liar or just delusional, and is it a binary?

Then there’s Billy, the husband who’s obsessed with stating the time, clams up about his family’s wealth, and criticises his wife for how she scrambles egg, which is the least of his ick. Billy’s behaviour elicits many of the more gasp-worthy moments in this film.

Fielder is the perfect Virgil for this journey, and if you’ve ever seen any of his previous work, most notably the TV shows The Rehearsal and Nathan For You, then you’ll be familiar with his approach of never revealing all his cards.

He presents a story, but the questions he’s really asking are often what’s not being voiced. He flits in and out of frame, sometimes staring awkwardly, which punctuates any effect Holmes/Evans might’ve hoped the doc could have been in terms of reputation rehab. The movie was their idea.

As much as the Holmes half of the film is eye-popping viewing, it’s actually the second chapter of You Can See Everything that is even more compelling and interesting, and upends what you think you already know.

After Holmes reports for her custodial sentence, Fielder no longer has access to his subject. There’s a two-year time-jump, and Fielder and co-director Lance Oppenheim (Primetime) picks up the project by trying to fill the hole created by Holmes’ absence.

Without spoiling the particulars of whom the filmmakers recruit to help them out, You Can See Everything becomes an examination of the construction and deconstruction of so-called reality.

Who is Holmes? Is she a character she created with the Steve Jobs black turtlenecks, low-octave voice and the distinctive red lipstick or a character everyone else imposed on her?

Is the Holmes we see through Fielder’s lens someone real? Or is she the AI avatar composed from a series of videos and images? Does she ever speak for herself or does she pull the strings of giving you the impression she’s not speaking for herself? Is this Holmes a manipulation of Fielder’s presentation?

In his TV show The Rehearsal, Fielder staged simulacrum of pending scenarios people wanted to face (such as becoming a parent), and he uses similar techniques here to dizzying effect. By the end of the film, it’s almost impossible to discern what’s real and what’s not, or even what “real” is.

You can see everything but you know almost nothing.

The film is a real puzzler, and there are multiple companion media you could watch, read and listen to try and understand the whole Holmes mystery.

But the film that seems most in line with You Can See Everything is not something explicitly about her or even Fielder’s previous oeuvre.

It’s Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo, a cinematic masterpiece You Can See Everything is clearly alluding to with its Bernard Herrmann-esque score and narrative structure.

In that 1958 thriller the identity of the tragic Madeleine Elster (Kim Novak) evades the obsessive Scottie (Jimmy Stewart), who falls in love with a shadow that was never really there.

Will the real Elizabeth Holmes please stand up?

Rating: 5/5

You Can See Everything is in cinemas on November 12