I love this movie so much

It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

Don't Believe the Hype

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

Good use of video smoking "Good Night, and Good Luck" is an exceptional film and much of it is because we too often forget our history...and as a result don't learn from it. It's an excellent history lesson. My only complaint is that the context for the Red Scare and McCarthyism is missing...and I would have appreciated it had it been included or even mentioned. While nearly everyone attacked for communist sympathies during this era were decent people, there were some things that gave reason for the concerns about communism. Stalin was behaving very threatening...decided to keep all of Eastern Europe following WWII and developing his own atomic bomb. But, and this is important, this does not in any way justify folks losing due process and their constitutional rights because of these fears...and the 1950s were a time of intense fear of the USSR. For folks unfamiliar with the era, this missing context might make the film a bit confusing. Despite this, the movie is a very important lesson..though the context might have been appreciated by retired history teachers, like myself!As far as the plot goes, the film is ABOUT Senator Joseph McCarthy but instead of focusing directly on him, you only see stock footage of him making his anti-communism tirades in Congress. Instead, the film centers on Edward R. Murrow and CBS's investigation of McCarthy and his methods...an interesting choice and one that makes the film quite clever. David Strathairn is excellent as Murrow and the director/writer/actor George Clooney did a nice job in capturing the feel of the time. Everyone is smoking heavily...which is what folks did back then. Heck, that's what ended up killing Murrow...a three-pack a day man himself! It was also smart to make the picture in black & white--as it not only captured the look of the time (when most everything was in black & white) but helped to make the McCarthy clips seem more real and less jarring. Overall, an exceptionally well made film...one well worth your time.

This is an important subject from a historical perspective. The "red scare" era, where everyone and anyone could be suspected of being a communist simply on the basis of rumours or hearsay, and where lives and careers were ruined because of the sometimes questionable connections that were established, and which gave rise to the otherwise obscure and undistinguished Senator Joseph McCarthy, is a fascinating one. This is even a relevant movie - because to some extent the smear tactics used against communists are being used once again against Muslims today, as politicians try to make names for themselves and win elections by whipping up fear. This is an interesting subject - because it focuses on the work of Edward R. Murrow, one of the greatest reporters of all time, in standing up against McCarthy, and committing himself to bringing the man down. And yet, important, relevant and interesting though it is, this is also a pretty dry presentation.Some people liked the decision of director (and co-star, as producer Fred Friendly) George Clooney to film this in black and white. I suppose there were reasons for it. First because it gave the movie a nostalgic feel (although increasingly there are fewer people who would feel the nostalgia because black and white television isn't even in the memory banks of very many people under the age of 50.) It might be that a political point was being made - the dangers of everything being seen in black and white terms. There are good guys and bad guys and never the two shall mix. To me, and I do have some memories of black and white TV, the black and white was a distraction. It added little to the movie. Overall, beyond the black and white, I thought the story seemed to lack something in the power department. It was very low key - TOO low key for my liking. Obviously I wasn't expecting an action movie, but I was expecting something a bit more dramatic.Not that there weren't many good things about this. First, I liked David Strathairn's performance as Murrow. He portrayed Murrow as I would imagine him - a no nonsense, tell it like it is kind of reporter who's willing to butt heads with the powers that be at CBS if he has to in order to tell it like it is. That certainly led to a critique of television that truly relevant today. To what extent does TV news seek to inform, and to what extent does it exist to entertain? How powerful are sponsors in deciding what can and can't be covered? Worthwhile questions, to be sure. I also appreciated the video clips of McCarthy himself. The movie also portrayed the tragedy of CBS newsman Don Hollenbeck (Ray Wise) who became himself tainted with communism after choosing to associate himself with Murrow's attacks an McCarthy, and ended up committing suicide - although, in reality, several weeks passed between that incident and Hollenback's death.Too much was made of the relationship between Joe and Shirley Wershba (Robert Downey, Jr. and Patricia Clarkson.) Co-workers at CBS, they were also secretly married, because at the time CBS didn't allow fellow employees of the network to be married. Quaint, perhaps, but I didn't think it warranted the amount of screen time it got.

I wish that I knew more about the story portrayed in Clooney's Good Night and Good Luck. I initially thought that the real problem here was that the film was just too short and sort of fell off a cliff, as though the budget had been drained and the production crew all packed up and went home, leaving Clooney to wrap up as best as he could.After reading some of the "hate" reviews here at IMDb, it does appear that investigations have been made into the basis of what is now the conventional wisdom (at least among liberals) according to which McCarthy was a witch hunter whose hysteria ended by harming many innocent people.Well, kudos to Clooney for at least getting people to think about these matters! The theme is incredibly contemporary, given our current government's obnoxious appeal to "State Secrets Privilege" as an excuse for withholding evidence about what is being done in the taxpayers' name. These days, it seems more like a ploy used by bureaucrats to protect themselves against charges of having wrongly killed and inappropriately spied on citizens, etc. I'll stick with my original '7' because I do believe that this film is worth watching, regardless of one's political slant. I liked the aesthetic use of black and white, and it was good to learn something about Murrow. Thanks, George!

I was alive in the early 1950s. And, as far as I remember, life was still in color. So why is this movie in black and white? Well, the artsy fartsies would probably say it brings reality to the story. Really? Because in reality, televisions -- like motion pictures -- at the time were at 1.33:1, not 1.85:1. The CBS studios were in completely separate locations, not in the same building. So from the perspective of making things "real", this film doesn't really do that.Now, not criticizing the film, but reality. In the discussion between William S. Paley and Edward R. Murrow in the film, the issue is the truth about Eugene McCarthy. But it occurred to me that Murrow didn't care so much about revealing the truth about...Liberace when he apparently knew he was being dishonest in an interview.In some ways, it must have been an easy film to write. Many scenes are verbatim from Edward R. Murrow's television broadcasts. Of course, putting them all together in an interesting sequence was important. I question the opening scenes of the film...boring.The acting in the film is excellent...I think. I'm not sure any actor could have truly captured the essence of Murrow, but David Strathairn, a superb actor, did about as well as anyone could have. Everyone else is secondary, and it's difficult for us to judge their performances since we don't know much about the real people they represented. However, it seems good.Of course, the film got rave reviews, which is pretty typical of films that deal with the McCarthy topic. It's certainly not a new topic, but it's a story that must be told over and over because there are always demagogs like Murrow, and they always seem to be conservatives who wish to restrict personal freedoms.But, as I watched the film, I sensed a lot of self-congratulations on the part of the media. Aren't "we" wonderful! Well, yes. But, sometimes no.Finally, I'm just curious. Did anyone at CBS not smoke?