REVIEW: State of Play (2009)
State of Play
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 127 minutes
Starring: Russell Crowe, Rachel McAdams.
My rating: 4 stars
Your Rating (Click stars to rate):
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Finally someone outside the industry understands the importance of newspapers and getting the full story. That’s really what State of Play is about, and it comes at the perfect time.
Now, I hope everyone will see it. I would like to watch it again with my journalism professors from school, and I would like to talk about it.
The Ithaca College chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists occassionally plays documentaries and movies that show the importance of journalism. I watched Good Night and Good Luck at one meeting. While State of Play isn’t an educational peace nor at the level of Good Night and Good Luck, it is one of the first mainstream media creations that effectively tells the importance of newspapers. I wouldn’t be surprised if this shows up at an SPJ meeting someday.
Cal (Russell Crowe) is a Capitol Hill beat writer for the Washington Globe. A woman dies in a metro accident. She is the lead investigator for Congressman Collins’ (Ben Affleck) research committee against a corporation that finances American wars.
Her death raises suspicions and Cal wants to uncover the truth. He must work against his editor, Cameron (Helen Mirren), who wants stories immediately since the bloggers are running with the scandal. Cal contests the bloggers don’t have all the facts yet and it’s not real news. One of these bloggers is Della (Rachel McAdams), a young, internet-savvy hotshot colleague.
Cal serves as her guide through the uncovering of corruption, greed, slander and murders. She eventually learns why people need to read reporters before they read bloggers.
Everyone knows newspapers are struggling. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is only publishing online content. Nearly every newspaper, if it hasn’t already folded, has gone through furloughs and layoffs. State of Play sheds a very positive light on the industry before it is too late. It’s just a question of whether people will listen.
I hope they do, not just because I work for a newspaper, but because newspapers are important to a community. Few other media, especially locally, have the same access newspapers do. Sourcing is almost non-existent in local television and radio. For years, these forms have thrived by developing stories first broken by a newspaper reporter.
Blogs are an even more embarrassing attempt at true journalism. Unless they are run by reputable reporters, there is little actual news it them. Blogs were created as opinion outlets. People would write column-like pieces about their thoughts on the news.
NBC.com has a “Nightly News” blog, which is just an inside look behind the scenes with anchorman Brian Williams. Real news is rarely broken on a blog, yet the masses think that’s where the news industry is headed.
State of Play shows us how dangerous that attitude can be. Newspapers develop a story, get facts correct and tell a complete story readers won’t get in a 90-second television package, a 60-second news-radio reader or from some blogger who only read the story a few minutes prior.
Forget the overall plot of this film and focus on what it’s really saying. Yes, it succeeds as a thriller and yes, it’s an entertaining premise that is paced well. But on the whole, this is a commentary on the state of journalism. Thank you writers Matthew Michael Carnahan, Tony Gilroy and Billy Ray.
Mirren doesn’t miss as the editor trying to appease the paper’s new owners who care only about sales and the journalists who still care about integrity. McAdams has an amazing transformation and realizes what it means to be a journalist.
Crowe successfully conveys the seasoned reporter, on his way out because of new technology. He’s probably only employed because of the institution of knowledge and the endless number of sources.
We are currently losing his generation – the ones who care deeply about real journalism. We are losing them because the general public doesn’t yet understand what they mean to our society. Hopefully that changes before we lose them all. We’ll surely miss good journalism if we don’t recognize the importance soon. Four stars.
NOTE: See Watertown Daily Times Managing Editor Bob Gorman’s column: Here's the Sad News on Economics and Newspapers
And his blog entry: Bob Deans: Black and White and No Longer Read All Over.
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