Journalists in Film: Heroes and Villains. Brian McNair. Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh University Press, 2010. 256 pp.
It’s no news to anyone who watches movies that journalism is a perennial and popular subject. Tales of intrepid investigative reporters working the mean streets at home or in exotic locations abroad, and who overcome countless obstacles as they doggedly seek the truth are, as Brian McNair observes in Journalists in Film: Heroes and Villains, inherently dramatic. Toss in compelling—if flawed—personalities to add some human interest, and you have a recipe for cinematic success.
You also have a useful—if also flawed—teaching tool. I have included popular films in both my media law and media ethics classes for many years. Although some purport to be docudramas adopting a serious and reverential tone—All the President’s Men (1976) and Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) immediately come to mind—many are unabashed comedies. Even though no one would take literally the satire of His Girl Friday (1940), films with humor appeal to students, and can, by eliciting laughter, prompt thoughtful discussion and debate.
McNair, a professor of journalism and communication at the University of Strathclyde, claims to focus on a fairly thin slice of cinematic history: seventy-one films released theatrically in the United Kingdom between 1997 and 2008. Some are Hollywood blockbusters; others are small, indie films with limited or no distribution in the United States, or anywhere else for that matter. But his book is more than simply an examination of ten years of film. McNair draws on a handful of iconic films to frame his analysis.
As indicated by the title, McNair divides his discussion into two broad categories: journalists as heroes and journalists as villains. His “heroes” include watchdogs (Edward R. Murrow), witnesses (mostly foreign correspondents, such as Daniel Pearl), artists (Truman Capote), and “heroines” (Veronica Guerin). McNair treats the women separately, he writes, not to ghettoize female reporters, but to reflect the reality that they present a “distinct category of movie journalist,” often stereotyped, marginalized, and relegated to women’s issues.
The journalists in the “hero” category are an estimable bunch. Many end up as martyrs, literally or symbolically, who uncover corruption and right wrongs, often at great cost. But as McNair points out, even the best of them struggle, not only with their personal demons, but with the eternal ethical dilemmas. For example, should a foreign correspondent strive for objectivity or subjectivity; stand aloof or become a participant?
Edifying as these heroes may be, the villains are clearly more fun. McNair’s irresistible groupings include “Rogues, reptiles and repentant sinners” as well as “Fabricators, fakers, fraudsters.” The “rogues” can be traced to the rollicking era of 1930s screwball comedies starring Cary Grant and Clark Gable, and more recently the likes of Richard Gere and George Clooney. “Reptiles” include plenty of paparazzi, along with manipulators like Robert Downey Jr.’s TV show host in Natural Born Killers (1994) or Kirk Douglas’ washed up reporter who resurrects his career by exploiting the story of a man trapped in a cave in Ace in the Hole (1951). The fabricators are writers like Stephen Glass in Shattered Glass (2005), ruthless in the pursuit of fame and fortune. But despite unfavorable public attitudes toward journalism, McNair points out that many of the films that criticize journalism ethics (or the lack thereof) were flops at the box office. Shattered Glass made less than $3 million worldwide, “approximately one hundredth of the revenues taken by ‘Borat,’” the mock-umentary featuring Sacha Baron Cohen as a Kazakh TV journalist). Critics may enjoy anguishing over the industry’s flaws, but viewers prefer their reporters noble or, better still, funny.
McNair’s final category, “King-makers,” includes media barons like Citizen Kane (1941), as well as gossip and celebrity journalists and the press agents who feed them. In fact, the cover photo on the paperback edition of the book is a portrait of Burt Lancaster in his role as the odious Walter Winchell-type columnist J.J. Hunsecker in Sweet Smell of Success (1957). Although relatively few films take on public relations, which McNair calls “a necessary but unloved element of the communications process,” he cites two recent examples: Wag the Dog (1998), with its manufactured war created by a Hollywood producer, and Thank You for Smoking (2006), depicting manipulation of public opinion by the tobacco industry. Both, of course, are satires. Or are they?
McNair wraps up with an appendix containing synopses of his seventy-one chosen films, including a brief critical commentary, production details, and box office receipts (the big winner was Spider-Man 3 at $890,871,626).
There is already plenty of literature describing and analyzing journalism in film, some going back to the days of silent movies. So why read this particular book? McNair provides an exhaustive list of recent films, including a few I had never heard of and would now love to see (such as Rag Tale, a 2005 satire about life at a British tabloid). The book is very easy to dip into, and to find films that can be used not only in journalism ethics and law courses, but also for classes in literary journalism or even history.
But beyond that, McNair’s analysis is thought-provoking, especially when he ruminates on the impact of citizen journalism and the transition to what he calls “the new reality” of reporting on the depiction of the media on film.
Will the next great journalism film classic, he asks, be called Citizen Citizen?
JANE E. KIRTLEY
University of Minnesota