It is a beautifully crafted film that stuck to the basics of great film-making

Rating: 9/10 (22 November 2010)

The timing (2005) of the movie is near-perfect. Americans have surrendered some of their freedoms in the name of President Bush's War on Terror through the Patriot Act. Good Night and Good Luck is a beautifully crafted film that stuck to the basics of great film-making – a good, tight story, great visual composition, marvelous performances by the actors and coherent direction. No frills, no state of the art computer graphics, no multimillion dollar superstars. But the genius of the director – George Clooney –lies in his use of TV film footage of Senator Joseph McCarthy in lieu of a live actor. And because the film is in Black and White (it was actually shot in color but converted to gray scale), the old McCarthy footage fell right in place.
Veteran actor David Strathairn played Edward Murrow with stoic intensity reminiscent of Gary Cooper. George Clooney's nonchalant under-acting complemented Strathairn's stark portrayal of the man who helped rid America of the junior senator from Wisconsin, who fanned the anti-communist hysteria and led the witch-hunt that destroyed the lives of many intelligent, freedom-loving Americans.
The film is not about the life of the popular and pioneering broadcast journalist Edward Murrow but rather on broadcast journalism itself. In the speech that bookends the film, Murrow emphasized that television, used strictly for entertainment rather than education, is nothing more than wires and lights in a box. The movie showed how free and responsible journalism can fight the enemies of Freedom just as Murrow and company fought the Terror known as McCarthyism or the Red Scare that gripped America in the early 1950s.
Although the film did not mention it, Senator McCarthy did not do it all alone. The road had been paved for him by Truman, Nixon, etc. He also had help from the country's foremost anti-Communist, J. Edgar Hoover, who was America's lifetime FBI director. Ironically, one of McCarthy's allies was Jack Anderson, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1972 and is now considered as one of the fathers of modern investigative journalism. McCarthy certainly was not alone. He was simply the eager spokesman / henchman.
Mass media perform four functions: to entertain, to inform, to influence and to earn money. Most films nowadays limit themselves to the first and the last. Good Night and Good Luck is almost a documentary. It is based on true events and verifiable facts. It is a great film on Journalism, especially Broadcast Journalism as well as on the Bill of Rights, its supporters and opponents.
The magic of cinema can influence more people than say, a novel. In this case, it will do the world a great service if this film can influence people, especially in places where the people need to be reminded of the precious concept called Freedom, particularly freedom from fear. Writer/Actor/Director George Clooney expressed the hope that the film might give some kids "some understanding of what and how dangerous a democracy can be if fear is used as a weapon." Since 9/11, George W. Bush and Tony Blair in their War against Terror fanned a Climate of Fear unmatched since perhaps the Reign of Terror in France in the 1790s.
In a representative democracy, the government is supposed to be "of the people, by the people and for the people." The leaders are elected by the people. If the leaders do their job well, they get re-elected and if not, they lose. The only way for the people to know if the leaders are doing their job well or not is through the mass media. Mass media's role, therefore, is very crucial in representative democracies. Thus, the US Constitution's First Amendment prohibits any laws "abridging the freedom of the press." Constitutions of other countries have similar provisions.
In the 1950s, McCarthy instilled fear among Americans by claiming he had a list that contained the names of American communists. Murrow argued that the line between investigation and persecution is a fine one and McCarthy crossed that line. Murrow and his fellow journalists decided to fight, whatever the consequences, the "situations of fear" that confronted America then.
Plato envisioned the ideal Republic to be ruled by philosopher-kings. But in today's political reality, leaders of republics may turn out to be intelligence-challenged clowns or megalomaniac queens. Political arenas are filled with demagogues, ex-military and ex-police generals, actors, basketball players and newscasters. Today's republics would be hard put to find a philosopher - king/queen.
However, a Scandinavian proverb says: "In each of us there is a king. Speak to him and he will come forth." Murrow and his colleagues sought out the kings/queens in themselves and helped bring back the ideals of the American Republic as envisioned by Thomas Jefferson and company.