Civil liberties must be defended at all cost

Rating: 5/10 (20 July 2013)

Good Night and Good Luck uses two plots to try to prove the idea that civil liberties must be defended at all cost. One plot is a reporter's external quest to defeat Mccarthyism: the violation of civil liberties in the name of national security. This plot succeeds: Mccarthyism is defeated. The second plot is the external quest representing the reporter's career and well being. This plot ends in a failure. So the movie tries to demonstrate the idea that civil liberties must be defended at all cost by showing that the successful defense of civil liberties cost our heroes their jobs, careers, and even their lives.
This idea is a timely one for us: today the world is captivated by the tales of Edward Snowden: an ex-CIA worker who has given up his career and possibly his life to reveal massive violations of the civil liberties of all Americans by their government. As of now, we don't know how this story ends. We don't know if the cost of his sacrifice was enough to earn a "success" of protecting our civil liberties. What we do know is that the US government, and much of the public, believe that it is necessary to give up certain civil liberties in the name of national security. What this movie tries to demonstrate is that the US Constitution is built upon the idea that basic freedoms cannot be compromised at all, and that they must be defended to the death. As our hero says:
"We can deny our heritage and our history but we cannot escape responsibility for the result. We proclaim ourselves as indeed we are, the defenders of freedom wherever it continues to exist in the world. But we cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home. The actions of the Junior Senator from Wisconsin have caused alarm and dismay amongst our allies abroad and given considerable comfort to our enemies. And whose fault is that? Not really his, he didn't create this situation of fear, he merely exploited it, and rather successfully. Cassius was right, the fault dear Brutus is not in our stars, but in ourselves. Good night, and good luck."
So the movie picked a very important idea to prove. Unfortunately, it doesn't do a very good job of proving it.
The plot depicting the cost of our heroes is bland. There are no uplifting turning points on this plot. The heroes lose money, security, their jobs, the lives and their careers in a steady drumbeat of bad news. Because there are no twists and turns along the ride of this plot, the costs seem episodic and didactic. This makes the heroes seem flat and unreasonably "good" as they continue their march against the villains irregardless of casualties and consequence. Basically there aren't enough twists here to keep the story interesting. None of the heroes undergo internal arcs (they are all conscientious from start to end) and none of them undergo relationship arcs (they are all in it together from beginning to end, even a married couple who were forced to split up).
This make the film seem didactic: it is a series of self righteous speeches by our heroes against the villains and we are asked to watch the movie with the hindsight of history to see their actions in the proper moral light.
Ironically, the Snowden story playing out today has more interesting twists and drama than Good Night and Good Luck:

we don't yet know if Snowden will be successful in convincing the American people to defend their own freedoms. - Snowden has obviously acknowledged and accepted the costs to his career and possibly his life. - Snowden's internal ideals are tested enormously now: he has ironically sought political asylum from countries that have horrendous human rights track records as compared to the USA. This has already compromised his public reputation and may affect the outcome of his external quest as he could become an international political pawn.

President Obama has even acknowledged in a condescending manner that the Snowden story might make a "TV movie" someday as he tries to convince the American people that civil liberties must be "balanced" with national security. Depending on how Snowden's internal struggles and his external quest turn out, his story just might prove the idea that civil liberties cannot be compromised at all and must be defended to the death.
My Story Chart of the movie is at storycharts.ca