Snowden is a movie.
Snowden is a 2016 American-German biographical political thriller film directed by Oliver Stone and written by Stone and Kieran Fitzgerald , based on the books The Snowden Files by Luke Harding and Time of the Octopus by Anatoly Kucherena . Snowden screened at Comic-Con on July 21 , 2016 , before premiering at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival on September 9 , 2016 . The film was theatrically released in the United States on September 16 , 2016 , by Open Road Films and on September 22 in Germany . It received mixed reviews and was a box office disappointment , grossing $ 37.3 million worldwide against its $ 40 million budget .