Good Night, and Good Luck

I'm a fan of the movie The American President. It's not some brilliant titan of cinema, but not every movie has to be. In it, Michael Douglas plays the President. During his election, his wife died, and it is strongly insinuated he got in almost on a sympathy vote (you know it's fiction, because that would never work), and he seems to be largely coasting on the residual feelings from that and his affable charm for the re-election. All the while, his rival hammers his policies and the fact he's romantically linked to a lobbyist. After spending 95% of the movie assuming his reputation and charisma will win the day, he finally sees the light, comes out unannounced during a routine press conference, and delivers a scathing rebuke. Even if no other moment in the movie is worth watching, Douglas' speech at the end is worth it as he verbally assassinates his rival. One of the lines that has always stuck with me, and has become more poignant as time goes on, is his takedown of his rival's strategy for campaigning. He says; "Bob Rumson is only interested in two things: making you afraid of it, and telling you who's to blame for it." As relevant as that line is today, it is just as, even more relevant for Good Night, And Good Luck, a movie that centers on journalist Edward Murrow's series of broadcasts criticizing the unjustified and unsubstantiated witch-hunts perpetrated by Joseph McCarthy in the mid-50's. McCarthy's snipe hunt for communists relied on rumor, speculation, and hearsay, making people suspect everyone they knew based on nothing but fear and propaganda, but he never offered anything even tangentially related to actual evidence, He didn't offer solutions, just fear and accusations. Murrow took exception to it. He used his weekly broadcast on CBS, despite the threat of cancellation or sponsor pull-out, to criticize McCarthy's baseless and slanderous crusade, and this movie explores that. I want to get the few flaws out of the way here, because this movie deserves way more time spent on praise. I got the feeling that this movie expects the viewer to be as familiar with all the names involved. For example, there's a scene towards the end where Alger Hiss is mentioned; aside from a passing reference in the Whacking Day episode of The Simpsons, nobody after Gen-X is going to know who Alger Hiss is, and Gen-X'ers might only know in passing. There's also a few, I guess we'll call them interludes?, where the narrative stops and we watch a radio performance of a singer. She's an excellent singer, and the music is lovely, but it does nothing whatsoever for the story other than to stop it in its tracks, and it happens three or four times. It's an odd and unnecessary choice. Okay, bad stuff done. Everything else about this movie is brilliant, starting with the theme. The movie is told in flashback, a few years after Murrow tangled with McCarthy, as he is being honored at a ceremony. Murrow surprises the crowd by using his speech to rail against television becoming a wasteland of mindless pablum, and that the people in charge have a responsibility to also use it to educate and, when necessary, shine a harsh light where darkness tries to overtake. This sets up the movie's central theme of media responsibility. Murrow gets pushback from his network bosses, he endangers his colleagues by putting them in the crosshairs of McCarthy for being associated with him, and he even admits that the audience may not want to see such heavy and consequential matters when they sit down at night to relax, To Murrow, it is nothing less than a solemn duty to not only report the news as it is, but to call out and question those in charge when what he sees is corruption. When an elected representative uses his power to bully and terrorize the citizens of the country if they dare think differently from him. Murrow is not presented as some saintly figure, a lone warrior fighting back against the machine; he's just a man with a strong sense of right and wrong, and he wants to use the power afforded to him for what he believes is right. Good Night isn't some hagiography, and while it doesn't go into how public sentiment had already started to turn against McCarthy, or how more and more members of the Senate itself were turning against him, that's not the story here. This is about Murrow v. McCarthy, so the focus is tight for a reason: to tell this corner of the story, not the whole saga. Doing that would've lost the message and muddled the theme. This could've easily been a vanity vehicle for George Clooney to both direct and act. Wisely, he plays a supporting role, Murrow's co-producer Fred Friendly. The role of Murrow goes to an actor whom I feel often gets forgotten when speaking of heavyweights, David Strathairn. It was a wise choice, as Strathairn absolutely owns every scene, showing both the sureness of his convictions and knowing the weight he's taking on by going after McCarthy. His deliveries of Murrow's monologues are as convincing and chilling as it gets, striking at the hollow heart of McCarthy's campaign of fear-mongering and finger-pointing. He was nominated for an Oscar, and by God, he earned it. The rest of the cast is equally excellent -- Robert Downey Jr, Patricia Clarkson, Frank Langella, Tate Donovan, and Ray Wise (maybe the best supporting performer here, as a colleague who is accused of being a communist and starts to buckle under the pressure) all turn in fantastic performances. Perhaps the most interesting choice, though, for casting, is McCarthy; he isn't played by anybody. They use archival footage instead, letting the repugnant monster speak for himself. It's another wise choice; putting someone in the role could've threatened to turn McCarthy into a mustache-twirling baddie, or the kind of crudely drawn stereotype one sees in lesser political thrillers. By using old footage, he's presented plainly and without embellishment, letting his anti-charisma and forced attempts at humility and "I'm just asking questions" hogwash speak for itself. The direction is equally fantastic. This could've been some Aaron Sorkin sweeping epic. Clooney clearly did not want that. He wanted the acting and the facts to be the hook, not camerawork. That's not to say the film is boring to look at, it's just that he lets the script do the heavy lifting. The camera is always where it needs to be, but never more than that, and for a story like this and for the way he wanted to tell it, it is impeccably done. The choice to present it in black and white is also a nice touch, giving the movie a feeling of eloquence but haunting distance in time. The characters and events feel like ghosts of the American past ... but ghosts were once human beings, and these events happened. And it sometimes feels like they still are. There is a certain population that will see a movie like this and automatically label it left-wing propaganda, stupid, fake news, and so on. To them, I can only shrug and express my sorrow that you are clearly the people this movie needs to reach and how sad it is it won't. The United States was literally founded because of rebellion and questioning authority. Its very roots are a middle finger pointed at the establishment. We should never be so blindly allegiant to those we elect that we trust everything they say. We should never let them turn us against us. We should always question, always push back, always demand explanations ... and when they won't listen to us, it is the job of the media to step in and hold feet to the fire. If you're afraid of doing that, the problem isn't with those who are willing to do so. Even though this movie does make clear distinctions about political parties, that's just the nature of the situation. This movie is here to remind us that all must be held accountable, but one has to do so with compassion and conviction.