Good Night, and Good Luck
Directed by George Clooney
Reviewed by Catherine MacLennan
In Good Night and Good Luck, broadcaster/journalist Edward R. Murrow (David Strathairn) and producer Fred Friendly (George Clooney) get excited about an idea: showing the nation who Senator Joe McCarthy really is by simply showing real film footage of him. They know it is an idea that will work at the same time they know it is an idea that will have Joe McCarthy, and the network bosses after them. They may even lose their jobs. Determined, they go ahead with the piece, anxious, but invigorated – Fred counts him down, Murrow gives his intro, and the clips roll. In the control room, on one of the s monitors is an Alcoa (Aluminum Co of America) commercial ready to roll. The advertisers will not be happy.
Clooney employs the same trick in "Good Night" – real clips of Joe McCarthy are inserted into the film – no actor was needed for that blustering, unibrow, over-the-top performance. The whole film is about performers – an ogre’s one man show to poison the nation; as well as another show: a show a gang of good guys want to put on to unmask the bully. The ogre’s show takes place in the senate committee rooms – a communist witch-hunt. The subjects of his “investigations” are unwilling players; versions of the show catch on across the nation. The good guys want to put an end to this show – Fred Friendly gives Murrow the cue to go on, Murrow’s in the spotlight and the delivery is dramatic (in the 50s, there was both live news and live theatre on television). Later in the bar, the gang gathers to read the critics’ reviews, with the camaraderie of a theatre troupe.
The good guys are doing more than putting on a show; they are dedicated to showing the truth, in a society that is chilled from demagogues gaining control. Of course, the movie is also about the current U.S. situation - where you are “with us or against us” – where politicians are shutting down any debate, and journalists often act as simply spokesmen for the government.
There is a certain aesthetic nostalgia for certain aspects of the 1950s – rather than the teen idol singer that Hollywood usually calls on to symbolize culture in that era, we have jazz singer Diane Reeves, singing grown-up songs in a grown-up style. The film is populated with grown-up actors, wearing grown-up clothes, speaking grown-up lines – far from the usual film fare of today – jokey, dumbed-down and populated with younger or botoxed actors. While the Murrow character has a sense of achievement about his daring journalistic work, he looks disgusted with himself when someone commends him on doing a “good job” in his light celebrity (punishment) show. An adult knows what is important.
It is hard to imagine a broadcaster fighting to put on the truth today. It is all infantile, all celebrity non-news infotainment, and the TV anchors are paid millions to say nothing.
In a speech in the film, Murrow warns about TV being used to “distract, delude and insulate” and when it does, it will have become “merely wires, lights, and a box.” Sadly, "Good Night" expresses nostalgia, not just for style but, for an era when television journalists dared to takes sides for the truth.