Alex Gibney.

• Position: THE PROGRESSIVE INTERVIEW - Interview

Alex Gibney is one of the hardest working documentary filmmakers in the world. His Oscar-nominated Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room gave an indelible portrait of that boondoggle. In 2008, he won an Academy Award for Taxi to the Dark Side , a harrowing documentary film exploring America's use of torture in the "war on terror." His acceptance speech was short and to the point, and ended on a somber note befitting the subject matter: "Let's hope we can turn this country around, move away from the dark side and back to the light."

Two years and one global financial crisis later, Gibney is back with another meticulously researched and eerily timely piece of nonfiction about the ways that power and influence are wielded in Washington. Casino Jack and the United States of Money , which opened in theaters nationwide on May 7, takes a close look at the rise and fall of America's most notorious superlobbyist, Jack Abramoff recently out of prison after serving a four-year stint in a federal lockup on felony counts of conspiracy, wire and mail fraud, and tax evasion. Abramoff was not the only one to go down in the scandal. The fallout eventually led to the conviction of Congressman Bob Ney, Republican of Ohio, and the resignation of then-House majority leader Tom "The Hammer" DeLay.

While justice may have finally caught up with Abramoff, the system of pay for play politics in which he thrived has by most any measure only gotten worse. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, lobbyists spent almost $3.5 billion in 2009--a billion more than what was spent in 2006, the year Abramoff was convicted. And the Supreme Court's January ruling in the Citizens United case, which swept away decades-old limits on political spending by corporations in elections, only opened the door to the betting parlor even wider.

On the week of the film's release, I caught up with a very busy Alex Gibney to get his betting odds on cleaning up the American casino, prospects for campaign finance reform, and what he and Abramoff talked about when he went to visit "Casino Jack" in prison. A few weeks later, I followed up with questions about his broader work, including his upcoming film about the rise and fall of Eliot Spitzer. He was accommodating both times.

Q: When you started to make Casino Jack in 2006, did you imagine that things could actually deteriorate?

Alex Gibney : What Jack represented was really just an exaggeration of business as usual. It's systemic. With...