Scrupulous Journalism in "Good Night and Goodluck"

Edward R. Murro, in "Good Night and Good Luck" treats his audience with respect and expectation of competent understanding of what he reports. He uses eloquent, sophisticated language combined with carefully aggregated information and makes a strong case and argument with patient and polite presentation. His very actions to report the story directly oppose the poorly based accusations of Senator Mccarthy, hence giving them more power against Mccarthy. He does not back down in fear when he bears the conviction of the truth and he welcomes opposition. He presents the facts in a manner that his audience can take and make a judgement for themselves. By these standards Murro preserves the two main foci of Journalism: The pursuit of truth and the loyalty to the citizen.

Provided below are two videos to compare the actual broadcast with the film portrayal.

Reporter's Favorites: Alex Beam

My uncle put me in touch with Alex Beam, a columnist for the Boston Globe. He spoke to me for a few minutes about journalism movies and offered his favorite film. He called me back and said "Sorry I'm calling you on the weekend. I hope Im not interrupting. Are you on a sail boat?" Laughingly I responded by saying "Oh, no, I'm just in my room. Thank you for calling me back!" When I asked him the question he first mentioned an interesting film called "Zodiac", but didn't offer it as his favorite necessarily. When I asked him again he responded by saying essentially "I heard your question on my answering machine and wish I had a more creative answer, but I'd have to say 'All the Presidents Men' would be it." He went on to explain his choice by saying "Most of what I know about it [watergate] I know from the movie...First of all, there is a lot of stuff you could say about the movie. Robert Redford is clean cut. Dustin Hoffman is scruffy. You have the Yale educated Woodward and not much information about where Bernstein was educated. Woodward is a very patrician character..." And he contrasts this image with the image of Bernstein in the receptionists office. He goes on to say "[As a viewer one] Feasts on a lot of those details [especially] the portrayal of deep throat which is fictional by nature. Now we know it's Mark Felt, [but at the time] they (Bernstein and Woodward) were not candid about how they got in touch with him. They gave the world this image of meeting him in a garage."

So, a sort of typical answer to the question of favorite journalism film, but in my opinion elegantly explained by Alex Beam.

For some of his columns check out this website. (Image is sourced from this site as well)

Reporter's Favorites

I interviewed two journalists from the Keene Sentinel. Here were their responses:

The first liked All the President's Men because it was an "awesome story, well-made movie, had great actors, and was close to the book." She also liked State of Play because of "all the twists and turns, Russel Crow's desire for the truth."

The second also liked All the President's Men because it was "inspirational and a realistic portrayal of how journalism works." He also liked Absense of Malice because it was a "good lesson of what not to do in journalism."

Reporter's Favorite's - Dave Rattigan

I was able to get in touch with Dave Rattigan - comedian extraordinaire, as well as an award-winning journalist whose work appears in major newspapers, websites and magazines. I asked him what his favorites films about journalism we're, and why.

He told me: "I've never seen All the President's Men from start to finish, So I'll go with the classic comedy The Front Page, which has been remade several times including into His Girl Friday (switching genders for the lead) and Switching Channels (switching the newspaper into a TV newsroom)."

It would be interesting to check out Switching Channels, having never seen it, but having seen His Girl Friday.

He went on to elaborate: "Of that group, I've seen all but Switching Channels, and liked the Jack Lemmon-Water Mathau version of The Front Page the most, probably because of the pairing of the actors. Although the Rosalind Russell-Carey Grant pairing was also excellent, featuring that fast-talking/overlapping dialogue style that really worked well. In all three versions, in a funny way, it depicted the detachment of the reporters from their subject matter -- and made it all about the story, story, story."

That seems to be a running theme throughout this course. Story, story, story. From Carey Grant, to Kirk Douglas, to Faye Dunaway, to Robert DeNiro, it seemed like all the different journalists, for their own different reasons, had completely detached from their subject matter, and only cared about selling papers or geting their scoop.

Good Night and Good Luck

The film is well shot and has good actors, but to me will always have a Clooney shadow looming over it. Not that Clooney’s direction is bad necessarily, it just feels like Clooney trying to impress to me. Dave Strathairn’s performance as Murrow was certainly the highlight of the film for me. His deadpan, stony-faced delivery of his speeches gives them a dignified confidence. He relies simply on his words and his message, rather than emotion language to make his case. This is one of the few examples we’ve seen where a broadcast reporter or journalist actually stood up for what was right, and true. Woodward and Bernstein were the only other good examples, and all happen to be real life stories. These people give me hope that journalistic integrity cans till exist in small pockets within this country, even in the face of seemingly insurmountable efforts.

This is one of Murrow’s best speeches, and is reminiscent of a lot of the issues touched upon in Network

"Reporter's Favorites"

As soon as I posted my last entry, I got an email back from Wendy Murray who teaches Feature Writing at Gordon and was a journalist for Christianity Today among other magazines. Here are her top favorites! Two of which we've watched!

Capote- portrays what it takes to write a thorough, complicated, journalistic, tragic piece. It also demonstrates the toll writing can take on a journalist.

The stoning of Soroya M.- powerful because it recognizes the importance of journalists being 'on the ground' (not reporting by reading other reporters reports). This story would never have been told if French-Iranian journalist Feidoune Sahebjam hadnt risked his own neck to tell a compelling and otherwise unknown story. His work has elevated the international profile of abuse of women in extreme islamic countries.

The paper- always remembered this movie because when the reporting had gone unverified, contradicted even when the presses were running, the editor literally 'stopped the presses' to re-run the corrected story. He was willing to take the financial hit to do the right thing journalistically.

Great choices i think!

"Reporter's Favorites"

After calling my local newspapers The Hartford Courant and The New Haven Register with no response. I called The Gloucester Times, The Boston Globe, Hamilton-Wenham Chronicle, also with no response! I finally got a call back from Dan Mac Alpine at the Ipswich Chronicle. He didn't have much time to talk, but did give me a list of his top three movies. Without hesitation he said that All the Presidents Men was by far his favorite. He also mentioned Blood Diamond with Leonardo Dicaprio- he said the reporter who broke the story was amazing! I never heard of this movie, but it looks good; might be a good addition for next year. Finally, he mentioned Network being his third choice, although he preferred print journalism movies.