Good Night, and Good Luck.

At the present times, when the film and film-making in general has undergone such a drastic change that more often than not, a major portion of the viewers is accustomed to a film with either action, a lot of humor, exceptional chills, over-the-top stories, and so on and so forth. The very root of film-making seems to have been forgotten. The film, we must remember, is also an agent of communication. It puts forward a message. Good Night, and Good Luck is such a film.

As we hear David Strathairn's Edward R. Murrow speak, we are reminded of the positive points of what we call television. He asks the public not to underestimate or overlook the fact that television has a potential to inform and educate. Good Night, and Good Luck is basically a political drama, playing out an event that took place in the early 1950's in the Columbia Broadcasting System. The war of words between CBS' broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow and Republican U.S. Senator Joseph R. McCarthy. It is more of a docu-drama with actual footages and dialogue from the happenings.

Directed by George Clooney, who also stars in the film, Good Night, and Good Luck is completely in black and white. It is exceptionally stylized. The repeated shots of Strathairn holding his cigarette, the light reflecting off his well-oiled hair, and his chiseled expressionless face; the glare he gives the viewers at the end of each broadcast, is the very point of the film. There is no added material here, no extra ingredients to spice up the events and modernize it, no effort to make it more appealing except for giving it the actual look and feel of the 50's. Almost the entire film is inside the CBS newsroom, or its adjacent offices. The music that occasionally plays in the background is more often than not a part of the diagesis, perhaps a jazz recording, or a broadcast in an adjacent room.


Then there is Edward Strathairn's performance. Flawless. His acting, more than anything else, takes us into understanding and realizing the consequences of the events that are taking place. The calm yet ruthless nature of him, the clarity with which he speaks in the broadcasts, is perfect. The supporting cast is also top notch with the likes of Frank Langella, Robert Downey Jr. and Patricia Clarkson. Frank Langella is exceptionally brilliant in the sequence in his office with Clooney and Strathairn.

At ninety minutes, the acting and the stylization make the film a visual treat. It is however suggested that one be informed of the events that the film portrays beforehand. It is the mere representation of an event; without any explanation, any commentary, any justification whatsoever. The film never tries to be something it cannot. It is not meant to be an entertaining action-packed film. It's action lies in the play of dialogue between characters and the facts that the conversations eventually reveal. It is man against man. One trying to bring out the truth about the other. It is a debate. It is a fiery battle of words between two men. It is about one man who dared to tell the truth, and went to all ends to bring it out into the open. Good Night, and Good Luck is a detailed and accurate account of the feud between broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow and Senator Joseph R. McCarthy.


Dare.

An Inconvenient Truth.

In 2004, the creators of the box-office hit Independence Day came out with another apocalyptic science-fiction film. Roland Emmerich's The Day After Tomorrow soon became one of the highest grossing films of all time. The crisis brought into account something that the entire world had been avoiding and hushing up for quite some time. Global warming, although indirectly, was finally being addressed to. Critics however did not much agree with the scientific accuracy of the film. Nonetheless, the destruction the film showed, opened eyes.

In 2006, came out a documentary on global warming. The piece was written by former United States Vice President Al Gore. An Inconvenient Truth was not merely a film on global warming. Not only did it address the entire topic at point blank, it also did not make the use of computer generated graphics to show us the crisis we were facing. Finally, the issue that the world might indeed be on the verge of chaos, the fault being our very own, was coming out into the open.


An Inconvenient Truth, apart from being an eye-opener by the time it ends, is also a film made with a lot of care. Just by looking at Al Gore throughout the entire screenplay, one notices the flawlessness with which he talks about the issues of rising CO2 levels and the state of the earth at the time of the last Ice Age. Even if The Day After Tomorrow was termed as scientifically inaccurate, it showed us things which, after seeing An Inconvenient Truth, one will realize were right. The known fact that students have learnt in school, about the temperature rising and the melting of the polar ice-caps resulting in a rise in sea-level, which eventually drowns low-lying areas, etc etc; is all true. All that and more. A particular sequence in the film shows us Al Gore commenting on satellite images of various low-lying areas of the world- The San Francisco Bay, the area around the rivers of Japan, the Bay of Bengal. Then comes the unexpected turn. The images that follow show us the state these places will be in in less than fifty years time given the continuation of dumping CO2 into the atmosphere at the present rate. The images are shocking, showing us the displacement of over 100million people all over the world. And that, speaking for itself, happens to be just the beginning.

When they marketed the film with taglines like 'Nothing is scarier than the truth' and 'By far the most terrifying film you will ever see' they actually meant it. An Inconvenient Truth beats any blood and gore slasher film when it comes to chills. The photographs of places on earth taken now and decades ago will shock you beyond belief. The change the earth has gone through in the last fifty years is more than the change it went through in the previous thousand. That itself is fact enough to make anyone realize the need for change, and the time at which the chance to act is running out. A very noticeable factor about the film's narrative is that Al Gore explains the entire progress of global warming, its consequences, etc etc; almost in layman's terms. More often than not he uses cartoons to explain the situation and bring it to life. The technique not only adds as a comic relief, but it also acts as a more effective explanatory technique ending with the realization of something dire. Making the truth all the more difficult to handle. It is a contrast that he uses to full effect.


An Inconvenient Truth also shares with us the life of Al Gore. One gets a very warm feeling listening to his story, right from the start. From where he lived, to how he grew up, and all for the purpose of showing us how much he wants us to care for his cause, how much he wants to see this world care about itself. It's very easily noticeable, how much effort the man himself has put into this project. The fact that the entire team have dedicated their heart and soul to this cause shows very clearly. This is not a film. This is a lesson. A lesson about the wrongs we have done to our planet, and the consequences we must face unless we rectify them. A lesson that everyone on the face of the earth should learn to see what Mother Earth is going through at the cost of our progress. It is time to face the music.

At the end of the film, contrasting the image of the Earthrise, which is perhaps the most influential environmental photograph ever taken, Gore talks about another photograph (the one above). It is a photograph taken by the Voyager 1 spacecraft taken from a record distance of 6.4 billion kilometers away. Known as 'Pale Blue Dot', the image is exactly as its name tells us. It is the Earth, lost in the vastness of space, a small dot in the middle of nowhere. An insignificant speck on the face of the Universe..
Or is it?

Care.

Children Of Men.

The closing credits of Children Of Men starts with the laughter of children, echoing a line spoken in the film itself - 'Very odd, what happens in a world without children's voices'. That line itself sums up the shocking nature of the film. This is not make believe science fiction. This is not human beings turning into zombies due to some drug. This is the slow death of the human race. This is humanity which has not heard a child's voice in almost two decades. This is chaos. This is disorder. This is dystopia. And amidst all that, this is hope.

Children Of Men sports all the characteristics of an action-packed science fiction film with its outstandingly orchestrated long and drawn-out single-shot action sequences, it's grim setting, the hinted darkness which is present throughout the length of the film, the beautifully grim and dead and at the same time uplifting background score and soundtrack. It is all that, and it is more. Within, lies hope. Lies faith. Lies redemption. Woven together with spellbinding perfection by director Alfonso Cuaron, Children Of Men is an apocalyptic film that raises the bar for films of the genre.


Based on P.D.James' 1992 novel of the same name, Children Of Men is an extremely well-written and well choreographed piece of cinema. The screenplay, most of the credit for which goes to Alfonso Cuaron and Timothy J. Sexton is an absolute gem. Emmanuel Lubezki's cinematography takes you to an entire different level in the art of film-making. The action sequences are brilliant. The picturisation, perfect. It is a relatively small film supporting an immense story. At an hour and forty four minutes, it never ceases to be jaw-dropping.

The year is 2027. It has been almost twenty years since the birth of the last human being. Starting of with the death of the youngest living human on earth, we are thrown into a world of turmoil. A world where human beings are grasping onto whatever hope they might have left. People are glued to the telecast airing the death of the youngest living human on earth. And hope, it seems, is fading away, ever so slowly. What Cuaron succeeds in doing at point blank is something we have already witnessed in some science fiction films of the decade. It is the same as what Spielberg did in The War of The Worlds, it is the same as what Abrams did in Cloverfield. We are tossed into the middle of a horrific crisis with no hope whatsoever of question or recovery. It takes us a few minutes to realize what exactly is going on. And therein lies the genius that makes this film brilliant.


The films boasts of some fine performances by Clive Owen and Michael Caine. Michael Caine, there for only a few sequences is a treat to watch. Oana Pellea, who plays Marichka the gypsy deserves special mention. She plays the character, who perhaps, gives you a feeling of hope. She cannot communicate much, yet she goes out of her way in order to help out as much as she can.

Children Of Men is simply a treat to watch. It is a film that will put you on the edge of your seat. It is a film that will get your heart racing. It will get you involved. There will be scenes that will shock you, scare you, awe you. And all to show you something even greater. Something even more important. You will feel the pain. You will feel the fear. You will feel the helplessness. You will feel the human race clawing for a grip at the edge of humanity. And at the end of it all, there will be hope.

Hope.