I saw Good Night and Good Luck last night at the Uptown Theater. A friend recommended it as reminiscent of the world of our parents men in white shirts, smoking cigarettes, doing important things. (My friend does not smoke, nor does she recommend it.) The film really is that; it did put me forcibly in mind of my parents' world. Clooney wisely decided to go with old tapes of Joseph McCarthy, rather than have an actor play him. That dictated that the film be shot in black and white, which coincidentally enhanced its historical authenticity.
Good Night and Good Luck offers a glimpse of how television news really works, the assorted pressures of running a commercial news operation, the complications that come from aggressively covering a government that has the power to regulate you via the FCC licensing process.
It is also a great film about fear, how silence enables it and how speaking out destroys it. Highly recommended.
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