Good Night, and Good Luck

Luck does indeed have a sense of decency, quite namely in David Straithairn's straight-laced and harrowed portrayal of Murrow.

Official Good Night, And Good Luck Site
Historical Drama
Starring David Staithairn, Robert Downey Jr, Patricia Clarkson, George Clooney, Frank Langella, Jeff Daniels
Rated PG (for language, thematic elements)
Running Time: 93 Minutes
Released:Octber 7th, 2005


4 Out Of 5 Bites

For some unenlightened, younger moviegoers, the subject matter of Luck might not ring with as much familiarity as with those who experienced it in its time or the more avid history-buffs amongst them. There is enough in its compact ninety-three minutes to inform and engage and it stands out in its simple black-and-white, even while mostly taking place in the Columbia Broadcasting System's studios.

Contained as a major heading in most 20th century American history texts, McCarthyism is a moniker denoting a period of time from roughly around 1950-1954 where the fears of the Cold War were gripping the nation. Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy (a Republican) headlined an effort to out and eradicate suspected general sympathizers and members of the American Communist Party movement, banking on an earlier Communist scare from the forties. His six-hour speech on the Senate floor in 1950 pointed to around eighty State Department individuals suspected of ties to the Communists and fueled the snowballing efforts to corral them.

By the time revered CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow reported on McCarthy on his show "See It Now," much of the public support for McCarthy had subsided. Many had seen ABC's running of the congressional hearings and saw, first-hand, some of McCarthy's demeaning tactics. From one famous exchange came the oft-quoted words of the Army's Attorney General Joseph Welch to McCarthy: "Have you no decency sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"

Luck does indeed have a sense of decency, quite namely in David Straithairn's straight-laced and harrowed portrayal of Murrow. His Murrow is so dead-on that you'd say the same of McCarthy's character, if you didn't know it IS McCarthy cleverly weaved into the scenes. We see him ruffled, sweaty and fiercely pressing his case in such a way as to appear ghoulish enough to mar the uninitiated, despite what such a one might know about the subject matter.

The whole movie basically smokes a cigarette, hearkening viewers back to the days when cigarettes were status symbols- if not good for you- judging by the sheer number of ads from the time and smokers non-chanlantly portrayed on screen. This is part of the allure of the film in our health-conscious day.

It is a cigarette laced with the edginess of knowing the principals had a part to play in whether or not the news media would become the monolithic maker of story that it is today, or something much less a spectacle of itself and an actual reporter of happenings that affect us. Luck encapsulates that sort of nostalgic hope in what director George Clooney fashions onscreen as black and white images depicting a time and characters that wished things were as such.

Clooney unabashedly calls out the megalomaniacal TV news machines and chastens them on the grounds of catering to the advertising dollar as the film explores the tension between CBS president William Paley, (quitessentially played by Frank Langella), and Murrow and his producer Fred Friendly (Clooney).

Murrow took to McCarthy's successful efforts to have Milo Radulovich dismissed from the Army Air Corps amidst tenous allegations of his communist collusion. When McCarthy rebutted Murrow on-air, taking him up on his offer to do so, it was devastating for McCarthy.

And devastating for Murrow it would turn as well as complaining advertisers were shuffling their dollars elsewhere. "See It Now" would be shuffled and shelved as well, ringing the death knell for TV as transformative and protective news source and receding into the realm of sheer entertainment.

Luck might wax a bit apropos in our era of media-imposed terror, tension and intrigue. Rife with money makers playing on our fears and appearing in the capes of the alphabet news channels, there appears to be no more room in the news room for aggressive news reporting and fairness in the name of decency. Those with the most money seem to be able to own most of what can or won't be said across the board. It is in this that the days depicted in Luck proved most prophetic.