Good Night, and Good Luck

Go! Black and white films rule!

This is a film about television as a medium, for information and entertainment. It's about the role and power of the press. It's about the bloviated egos of politicians and especially, senators. "Good Night" skillfully blends new and vintage footage to show the timelessness of these big issues, which never change even though the players do.

Because the modern filmmakers have hindsight and intend these events from 50 years ago to mirror modern issues, they have clearly written the screenplay to resonate forward in time. This reminds me in a weird way of the pesher technique described by Barbara Thiering in her far-out (and discounted by most scholars) book about interpreting biblical texts.

At 93 minutes, this is a tightly packed and well-paced movie that is worth seeing, and whose theme is "the truth will out", as long as vigilant public institutions perform.