Spotlight (2015)

“Spotlight” is a newsroom drama unlike anything since 1976’s “All the President’s Men,” and print journalists need an adrenaline shot of moral support, a reminder why the Fourth Estate is essential. We follow the investigative team of “The Boston Globe” -– led by Michael Keaton, with support from Rachel McAdams and Mark Ruffalo -– in 2001 as they uncover one, then a dozen, then 90 cases of child sexual abuse by the Catholic Church, an organization that uses the name of God to cover its depraved corruption. “Spotlight” shows the miserable decline of newsrooms, the low pay, and yet the dedication of reporters to corral the powerful. Also on display: The crushing, irreparable hurt of the abused, their faith stolen, and lapsed Christians who long to believe again, but find little cause to do so. The clincher: Director TomMcCarthy damns the same journalists for not acting sooner while playing “Spotlight” as even and dead-eyed serious as the best of investigative journalism. The lack of sensationalistic punches is a strength. A-

Nightcrawler (2014)

Imagine a dead serious “Network” written in the darkest pit of humanity, all humor strangled by an utter lack of empathy, with the journalism game run by any dick with a camera. That’s “Nightcrawler.” Jake Gyllenhaal plays Louis Bloom, a petty thief who one night finds his calling: Filming accidents, murders, house fires, and drive-bys, the fresher the gore the better for a top TV news slot. His “employer” is LA’s lowest-rated station, a bottom feeder with the mantra of fear sells. His “boss” is the vampire-hour editor (Renee Russo) who knows her middle age means job death. Bloom speaks in Internet PR babble, product comments, and tweets, using a deflated voice and spouting his love of accounting. He vibes Leo Bloom from “The Producers,” if Bloom had no soul. (Not Joyce Bloom.) Looking starved with bulging eyes, Gyllenhaal is a monster of success as he places civilians and police in harm’s way for a sell. Director/writer Dan Gilroy never judges, he shows us a mirror of journalism endlessly sinking in its race to hit ratings and print money, where cameras are as dangerous as guns. This is the world “Network” warned us about. A-

His Girl Friday (1940)

The perfect romantic screwball. Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell are NYC journalists with the love they have for getting the latest story surpassed only by their love for each other. Odd then that they -– Grant is editor Walter Burns, Russell is reporter Hildy Johnson -– cannot stand each other and were quite recently married. Not enough room in a marriage when the third and fourth partners are outsize egos. The plot is beside the point against dialogue that demands instant replay as every rounded machine-gunned line pops one after the other and on top of one another, leaving the viewer spellbound. But here goes: Hildy returns to the newsroom that is her church and busts in on Burns’ office, declaring her intent to quit and marry an insurance salesman from Albany (Ralph Bellamy), which in newspeak equals marrying a scarecrow from Kansas. Burns has one ace up his sleeve: A sizzling murder trail he knows Johnson won’t refuse. The rest is marvelous. The puns and name drops (“Archie Leech!”) crash the fourth wall, a shout to the audience that no matter how much fun they’re having watching, the actors had more fun playing it. A+

The Secret Village (2013)

Two low-budget films: “Monsters” –- made by “Godzilla” director Gareth Edwards -– and “Blair Witch Project”— the found-footage creep-out that launched a genre. Tightly edited. Tense scenes made sharp with glimpses of the unearthly. Finales that leave emotions raw. Similarly budgeted horror-thriller “The Secret Village” has … none of that, not an ounce of ballast to carry its Midnight Movie plot. Here, a young journalist (Ali Faulkner) arrives in a New England town to investigate numerous deaths reaching back to the Salem Witch Trials. Townsfolk are hostel: Leave or die. She is stalked. All along, something is off deep inside her. Sounds intriguing? No. Director Swamy Kandan has made a film so direly boring and incomprehensibly edited, I was left admiring home architecture and the bed comforters. Kandan has other film credits. Guessing on his go-to scare tactic, they must all feature chubby old men in robes. F

Scoop (2006)

“Scoop” is a Woody Allen thing so forgettable and oh-so-Woody Allenish bland, I watched it the other day and only at the very, very end did I realize, “Oh, I have seen this before.” Folks, that never happens. And it stars Scarlett Johansson and Hugh Jackman. That’s some feat. SJ is a college newspaper reporter who finds herself on the trail of a possible serial killer who also happens to be a royal Brit (Jackman) and she falls for him, to the chagrin of her unlikely pal (Woody Allen), an old magician who entertains tourists who’d rather be in Vegas. Not London. The story idea seems solid, even if our reporter first has sex with her interviewees before interviews. I could guess this another Allen fetish, but college girls seem too old for him. It’s the execution. From the absolute lack of any suspense, odd for a thriller, to Allen’s shit nightclub jokes older than his leads. Snooze. What are the chances he wrote this in 1966 and updated not a word? C-

We Steal Secrets: The Story of Wikileaks (2013)

Timing can make or break a film. The documentary “We Steal Secrets: The Story of Wikileaks” is superior in every way to “Fifth Estate,” the overcooked dramatization of anarchist/hacker “journalist” Julian Assange. I saw the fictional film before this, a reversal of their respective cinema rollouts. This is akin to fresh air. Director/writer Alex Gibney compiles deft footage of an uncooperative Assange and his empire of nerds to portray a group of rebels out to crash all-powerful, secret-obsessed corporations and governments. But with fame comes power, and corruption. Assange falls to paranoia and his own secrets, damn the costs. As well, we see painful chat-room quotes from Private Bradley/Chelsea Manning, whose story also figures heavily here. His tale is a film onto itself, a true whistleblower hero to Assange’s loud bullhorn. As talking heads, U.S. spy chiefs and military honchos alternately damn and dismiss Assange and Manning as blips on the NSA’s endless, all-powerful eye of Sauron. Gibney lets us decide who is more trustworthy, even if there are no “good guys,” and he -- thankfully -– does not need hyperbolic lines or fake CGI desk-burning to let us know this is not history, but a new, never-to-end struggle of truth. A-

Dirty Wars (2013)

“Dirty Wars” will enrage any American with a soul. It’s a grueling and honest Come to Jesus documentary on the U.S. military’s expanding War on Terror, with no bounds, boundaries, or accountability. Journalist Jeremy Scahill is our sole guide as he leaves U.S.-approved field reporting and ventures into rural Afghan homes to investigate raids by the secretive Joint Special Operations Command. During one such hit, nearly an entire family is killed, including women, a child, and a police chief. The distraught relatives have video footage of troops carving bullets out of the dying victims. Our leaders shrug, so what? Scahill asks why, digs deep, finds informants and threats, hits brick walls, and finds more war horror -– the assassination of a teenager -– and a direct line to the White House. Once the promised hope of liberals, Obama has outpaced Bush in secrecy and a body county unknowable and unexplainable. “Dirty” is a stellar work of journalism, and yet double-edged: Overly dramatic footage of Scahill typing in the dark of his apartment whiffs of Hollywood drama. But how else to tell this story? We need Scahill’s ego and hunger, because we’ll get the truth no other way. A-

The Philadelphia Story (1940)

I need to get this out: “The Philadelphia Story” opens on a gag of a man shoving a woman to the ground, and the joke she got “socked” runs throughout. That shit is not funny. Not then or now, or ever. That said, I do dearly love this deserved classic, the writing, banter, delivery, and cast: Katharine Hepburn, James Stewart, Cary Grant, Ruth Hussey, and the child actress Virginia Weildler, can you top that? Plot: Philly society divorcee Tracy (Hepburn) is up for marriage No. 2, but her ex (Cary Grant) hangs close because Tracy’s family loves the guy unconditionally, and in an elaborate plot he has two gossip mag reporters (Stewart and Hussey) in tow to record the surely doomed nuptials. See, the ex loves the bride, and as hijinks, misunderstandings, and boozy drinks flow, soon so does Stewart’s wordsmith. I shall not divulge more, just watch. This is comedy romance at the tallest order, it makes you swoon for everyone on screen, with Stewart pushing charm, Grant smoothness, and Hepburn brass and brains. Yes, many plot ideas are way past sexist and stagnant, but this film shines. Love the journalism jokes, too. A-

Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

With a budget well below $1 million, the Sundance Film Festival hit comedy “Safety Not Guaranteed” asks us to be believe in time travel as reality not because of any high-tech CGI gadgetry on screen, but because the lost soul at the center of this remarkable, funny, and wide-eyed cynic-free tale truly believes in his ability to bend science. It’s all he has in his life, his only shot at true happiness. Besides, the film opens with a journalist at “Seattle Magazine,” pitching a profile feature that requires a long-distance trip of several days, and two interns as assistants. That’s far less likely than time travel. 

So, Jeff (Jake M. Johnson) is the journalist, all wrinkled shirts, coffee stains, and beard stubble, intrigued by a newspaper classified ad that seeks a partner in time travel, “safety not guaranteed.” Jeff – highly cynical, rudderless, a bit of an asshole, and much like many a journalist I know – smells a kook, and think it will make for great reading fodder. Or so he claims. His real mission is to get to the tiny Washington state beach front town the ad originated from, and hook up with an old flame from his high school years. 

His interns are a lonely college student (Aubrey Plaza) still crushed by the death of her mother, and an Indian science nerd (Karan Soni) afraid of girls. They track down the ad’s time traveler, Kenneth Calloway (Mark Duplass), a grocery clerk with a throbbing streak of loneliness, regret, paranoia, and gun-love. 

Plaza’s Darius goes undercover ABC News style as Kenneth’s time-traveler companion, trying to get the scoop: Is Kenneth crazy, mentally ill, dangerous, or a true time-traveling scientist. The answers are surprising, endearing, and out-of-this-world-and-time awesome. I won’t dish on why Kenneth wants to go back in time, but the lead up, and his refusal to let Darius see the device leads to great comic highlights (a break-in at a tech firm whilst a major company party is going on) and heartfelt (yes, Darius soon falls for Kenneth and all his quirks, but her own quirks are just as strong life-suffocating). Meanwhile, Jeff’s bid at reunited love goes awry, as it must, and he obsesses about manning up Karan’s nerd. 

Director Colin Trevorrow and writer Derek Connolly paint a small portrait of adults who already are in a way time-traveling, their minds and souls stuck in the past on regrets, things said wrong, and missed opportunities. The final scenes, as FBI agents chase our reporters chasing Kenneth are a blast, and made one college co-ed behind me in the theater near jump out of her chair with a cheer. I agreed, and wanted to cheer that loud.

As with the characters, there are some points here of much regret, mainly Karan’s character – the lonely, giant-eye-glass wearing nerd from India studying science and afraid of women. It’s an awful, old stereotype so over-used in film and TV, it may – if it hasn’t already – surpass the sidekick cliché of the best pal who’s flaming, lisping, cross-dressing gay. Both character types really ought not to appear in any form of art not written by people older than high school age. That said, Duplass gives an amazing performance as Kenneth, twisting audience sympathy and distrust of him around on its head a dozen times over. 

“Safety” may not have big-screen pop! of much-loved time-travel Hollywood blockbusters such as “Back to the Future” or “Terminator,” but it’s brain and heart is bigger, and I’d love to go back in time and re-watch this film for the first time again and again. (And, hey, after the ugly “Men in Black 3,” the science of time travel needs a big pick-me-up.)

Cool fact: The ad that starts this film, which reads, “Wanted: Somebody to go back in time with me. This is not a joke. You'll get paid after we get back. Must bring your own weapons. I have only done this once before. Safety not guaranteed” is real. It was placed in a nature magazine by a man from Oregon a bit more than 10 years ago. When every other film out now in cinemas is a remake or a prequel/sequel, or based on a comic book, it’s a blast to know one fresh idea can shine bright, and be based on a 150-letter ad from a man who may be mental or more genius than we can ever know. A-

Morning Glory (2010)

“Broadcast News” for the Kardashian Age. “Morning Glory” is a sweet woman-at-work-rom-com, with bright-as-the-sun Rachel McAdams as a Jersey girl-turned-TV-producer bounced to the New York A.M. news circus. Not “Today,” or “Good Morning, America,” but a bottom-rung show called “Daybreak,” with a pervy egotist (Ty Burrell) and a prima donna (Diane Keaton) as the leads. Out goes the creep, and in comes once-great news anchor Mike Pomeroy (Harrison Ford), dragged kicking and glaring by McAdams’ hap-hap-happy Becky Fuller. The film takes limp wimp shots at the news-or-glitter debate that befuddles newscasters, yet takes a full dive with an answer that is pure Reality TV Hollywood: Who cares about content, as long as people are buying. I’m not shocked. The rom-com is similarly dull as Patrick Wilson as Mr. Right for Ms. Fuller is so nice-guy blank, the character could have been played by Wilson the Ball from “Cast Away.” The cast saves the day. Ford plays his infamous cold personality to great effect, and Keaton is bubbly and winning, as she always is on camera. B-

Page One: Inside the New York Times (2011)

Is there a better hero for “Page One: Inside the New York Times” than David Carr? He is the guy every young journalist – myself included – has met and envied. His voice cracks like a car compactor chocking on a tank, and his body says north of 80, but he’s maybe 50. He has burned years and brain cells on booze and drugs, and yet come back fighting. Their real drug, though, was and is getting the big story. The quote. Nailing the Big Bad Wolf. I was an addict. Shit, that man is cool.

Carr is the “New York Times,” according to Andrew Rossi, director of this documentary. If Carr can rise from the ashes, then the “Times” can. And the paper has seen its share of ash. The Jayson Blair scandal. Management upheavals. Advertising and revenue wilting as the economy falters. The real kick in the balls: A vastly changing media landscape courtesy of the Internet, 15, 20 years young and far more powerful than the centuries-old printing press. All the news in the world one click away. No more wait for home delivery or newsstand runs. How is The Gray Lady (and the entire newspaper industry) going to get back fighting again? The answer is, of course, the Internet.

Rossi follows more “Times” staffers than Carr, including a war reporter who can file stories from a fox hole, and the new media kids on the block who spit out Tweets like reporters of old sucked down cigarettes. It isn’t easy. A longtime obituary writer is laid off, and anyone who has worked in news will cry for her. I did.

There’s something ironic about the title “Page One.” Having worked at newspapers, I well know the plans – sometimes weeks ahead – of what goes on the front. What is the “face” of the day? Sad death reports. Angry piss at corrupt bureaucrats? Happy features on three-legged dogs? The very idea of such is going away as websites change out the headlines hourly. For the better? No one knows. “Page One” touts meaningful investigative journalism, and shits on an upstart website that treats shocking poverty and war as some ironic gag. Is this what we want? Are we as a nation more interested in the Kardashians than the economy? If that’s the future, we are doomed.

“Page One” isn’t perfect. The ending – where the “Times” wins several Pulitzers in a major staff announcement – is a fumbled climax to a race I didn’t know was occurring. Another sticker: We see a heap of talking guy heads, all as white as me. That is not the modern “New York Times,” or modern journalism, or modern America. Still, a must see for anyone with ink running through his or her veins, and who fondly recalls the rumble of a massive printing press starting up as a magical childhood memory. Every newsroom scenes rock, Rossi film nails the banter and slams, and the editor who calls the liar, “liar.” B+

Restrepo and Wasteland (both 2010)

Documentaries are fast becoming the sole way to open the eyes of filmgoers to the world not just around us, but on the other side of the planet.

“Restrepo” perfectly fits the bill. Directed with journalistic just-the-facts terseness by Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington, it follows a U.S. Army combat unit in Afghanistan’s infamous Korengal Valley. With boots fresh on the ground, the unit’s most popular member is killed: Juan Restrepo, a Columbian native who made the United States his home. The surviving men dedicate themselves afterward to his honor.

Filmed on location with follow-up interviews later, the viewer is shown every aspect of these men’s existence: Days of boredom, and then sudden, constant attacks by snipers. The stress is immense: Who can you trust? What happens when you frack an enemy hideout and kill a child? This is riveting, heart-breaking and heroic material, about American men putting their lives on the line, half a world away. The interviews pack devastating emotional punch. A late-in-the-film gun battle is nearly too much to bear, and thankfully, nothing too graphic is shown. This is a must-watch for any and all adult Americans, no matter the political stripe, and lands high on my favorites films of 2010. It’s simply just unshakable. Shockingly, Hetherington was killed in combat in 2011, filming in Libya. A

There is no violence in “Wasteland,” unless you count the economic destitution that can suck the breath out of a viewer. This documentary follows modern artist Vik Muniz – he does wild stuff with a camera – as he spearheads a project involving dozens of people who (barely) make a living by scavenging recyclable material from mountains of fetid garbage at a massive landfill in Rio de Janeiro. Muniz’s idea: Form large, intricate images with found trash, and photograph the image as art. The subjects are the scavengers themselves: A young mother, an elderly man and a young father attempting to form a union for his fellow scavengers, to protect their rights and lives. The scavengers suffer from diseases and fungi, and have seen dead bodies thrown in the trash, but they are glad for any employment. (Heartbreaking.)

Muniz, a Brazilian, knows he is walking a fine line: Exploiting the workers, or lifting them up. A couple scenes (Muniz and his wife argue) feel a bit stilted (reenacted?) for the camera, and the subtitles fly by too fast, but these are small complaints against a story that, like the best of art., should be shared with all. A-

The Sweet Smell of Success (1957)

“The Sweet Smell of Success” sizzles with the best dialogue -- “You’re dead, son. Get yourself buried”-- ever put to screen, a funky jazz score by Elmer Bernstein, and a sleazy night-owl view of New York so vibrant, it burns the eyes. It’s a pitch-black film noir about corruption, fame and journalism run amok even more relevant in 2010. Tony Curtis is Sidney Falco, a soulless PR hack slaved to J.J. Hunsecker (Burt Lancaster), a famous/vile newspaper Winchell-like columnist who spreads lies, innuendo and pure bullshit, all wrapped up in false American patriotism. He’s the Glenn Beck of his day, his own God. Hunsecker won’t print Falco’s news unless the latter breaks up the columnist’s kid sister and her musician lover. Hunsecker, you see, wants his sister so damn bad. Perv. Spineless Falco obliges and suffers greatly. Lancaster makes one scary demagogue, while Curtis blows his role out of the water. You can see the lies form in his mind before they slither out his mouth. Alexander Mackendrick’s direction is razor sharp, and the Clif Odets/Ernest Lehman screenplay draws blood. A+

Fletch (1985)

Chevy Chase is in nearly every scene of “Fletch,” a guy-and-a-dame gumshoe spoof done far better and deeper in “The Long Goodbye” a near-decade earlier. But this has a slice of Woodward/Bernstein-tweaking journalism. Chase is “L.A.Times” reporter Irwin Fletcher, a master-of-disguise undercover star reporter with a Jane Doe byline. His recent gig has him on the path of drug-dealing beach bums until he’s sucked into a murder-for-hire scam that will take him all the way to exotic Idaho. The whole plot is a screwball joke. There’s a good deal of laughs as Chase dons disguises or just balls-out improvises his way through interviews, mostly with dumb people, snatching and stealing info for his story. I wish the film had more spark or life, but it happily glides from start to finish, just as Fletch glides through deadlines. Chase’s seemingly effortless deadpan work is riotous. B+

Capote (2005)

Watching “Capote” is almost dizzying: It’s a film based on a nonfiction book that documents Truman Capote’s research and writing of the ground-breaking nonfiction book “In Cold Blood,” which was later turned into a celebrated 1960s film. The twist here: Not only was a Kansas farm family butchered in cold blood for roughly $50, but Capote (Philip Seymour Hoffman) reported on the initial crimes and then manipulated the subsequent trials to his own liking, in (ice) cold blood. Capote is played as the ultimate self-centered artist: Everything and everyone is in service to his convenience. When he sees the farm family bodies in their coffins, the moment of horror is about his reaction; after he gets the killers new trials, he panics that he won’t have a solid ending by deadline; he scoffs at the success of friend/co-researcher Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird.” This is a fascinating, layered tale of a man who, biblical cliché alert, loses his soul to the gain the world (or the world’s admiration) and seems to realize it. Or does he? That Hoffman manages to not only humanize Capote, but make him a victim of his own ego is a wonder. A-

Network (1976)

"Network" is one of my Top Ten films of all time. By God, not a week goes by where I don't quote it. Or think about it. And I have posters of the film on my walls at home and in my office. So, I love it. It is the ultimate cold-hearted, sick satire of the American news media hell-bent hooked on Nielsen ratings (the crazier the news, the more people watch), and capitalism run amok.

William Holden is the (so it seems) stalwart TV newsman, the knight in shining armor, who gets his mettle tainted when his best friend and TV anchor (Peter Finch) has a nervous breakdown on air. He's sucked into a ratings war with the Big Three (remember those days?), office politics and an affair with a much younger woman (Faye Dunaway, never more alive and fierce), who would burn a child alive for a Nielson point.

Written by Paddy Chayefsky and directed by Sidney Lumet, the 1976 film is still deadly on target, striking a blow against an American public bored with itself and the corporate drones who feed that hunger. Ned Beatty's monologue as a CEO is historic, and ought to be required viewing in every college classroom across the nation.

"Network" also is one of best-acted movies ever: Beatrice Straight mesmerizes as an angry wife and Robert Duvall throttles off the screen as a soulless corporate demigod. But it's Finch who rules the film. His "I'm as mad as hell!" rant is among the greatest scenes in film, and still startles me after more than a dozen viewings.

I haven't even started on the sexual and racial politics that Chayefsky rips apart for all to view. A must see. Unless you're a conservative who thinks corporations and churches have your best interest in mind. In which case, Ha! A+

State of Play (2009)

"State of Play" may be the last of its genre: The newsroom thriller. As recent headlines tell us, the days of the nose-to-the-gravel newsroom reporter and morning ink on fingers are gone. Replaced by gossips who'd rather dish opinion than fact. The reporter here is Cal (Russell Crowe), a fat, long-haired slob who is covering a double murder in D.C. Meanwhile, his best pal (Ben Affleck) from college is in trouble on Capitol Hill -- he's in Congress and in a pickle after his lover/assistant dies mysteriously. Cal soon finds himself covering the story and trying to protect his friend, and not just out of loyalty. He's banging the man's wife. This ain't Bernstein or Woodward. Amid a sea of nifty plot twists and double crosses, "Play" debates the demise of hard-hitting journalism as it falls under the steamroller that is the Internet. But it gets a lot of things wrong -- from reporters playing CIA to the lack of technology such as smart phones and digital recorders. The climax settles on Cal getting the full story out in print, with no need to break it online. Fast. Is this film set in 1996? B

A Mighty Heart (2007)

"A Might Heart" is never dull, never less than moving and always earnest in its emotions and portrayal of politics and religious red tape in post-9/11 Pakistan, but it's also rushed and confusing.

It tells the story of Daniel Pearl, the "Wall Street Journalist" kidnapped and murdered by terrorists in 2002 as he set out to interview a (false) source. Angelina Jolie is Marianne, the wife of Daniel (Daniel Flutterman), who was beheaded in an infamous filmed action that burned through the Web more than five years ago.

Directed by Michael Winterbottom, the film is journalistic in its portrayal of the events leading up to and after the kidnapping. The politics and religious ramifications run deep -- most of the Pakistani officials seem worried about their reputations or dumping on neighbor India than finding Pearl -- and can be deeply confusing (putting on the subtitles helps), but that may be the point. In America, we live in a country that to most of the world must be in its horrible teenage years.

The political/religious/racial confusion is not the fault of the film, but are of our (my) lack of knowledge of the region. Much as we're told, America is not the center of the Earth. On location filing in Pakistan is the core reason this film succeeds, there's not much of a false note here and everything seems real. The poverty and chaos depicted in just a few minutes on screen open a door to a world I didn't know about prior. That's the beauty of film.

Jolie is great as Marriane, although one never forgets you're watching Angelina Jolie in an Important Role. She's lost that unknown quality. That may be the fault of tabloids more than the art on display here. But it hurts the film nonetheless. B