Brief movie review blog

Goodnight and Good Luck 

Being a journalist during the 1940’s-1950’s was no easy task. The long hours and never-ending criticism took a major toll on each of them daily. Their opinions were constantly ridiculed, so was the truth. This film focuses at the start on Edward R Murrow being honored for his work on TV. Instead of making said honor focused on his accomplishment though, he goes a bit deeper in his speech. He speaks with a purpose about how TV should no longer just be solely for entertainment and fun. He says it needs to be educational to those watching. People should be gaining knowledge, not losing brain cells. This was a strong opening to the entire documentary as the rest of the documentary is people bringing each other down, exposing one another, and all around negativity around the profession they are all doing. 

CBS was the company they were all were all working for at the time. There were so many different controversies at this time in the media, but the main target was those in support of communism/ those who were communists. With that being said, the “bright” faces on television began to use this as a target for the people around them. At the hardest of times they would be accusatory of someone working for CBS being communist. When this occurred, that person kind of laughed it off because she had expected this immature nature, and she spoke her own truth.

The entire documentary was very fast-paced but it was deep and it was real. Back then with the amount of anger people had at each other and the world, there was so much behind the scenes that nobody knew about. This film brings this to light very well and is not only entertaining, but educational. 

Extra Blog

Nellie Blye

Nellie Blye was a woman of dedication. She put her all into every piece she wrote and threw herself into her projects 110%. She was a woman of many talents, which eventually led to her induction into the women's hall of fame. Her work began when she wrote a response to an offensive article she had read. Her response got buzz and from there she was offered a position at Pittsburgh Dispatch. Her early work here was focused solely on working women, starting with a series all about women who were working in factories. After this, for a full six months she focused more specifically about writing on the lives of Mexican women and their work ethics/ professions. Through this work, she did lots of traveling. As a journalist, she spoke on how much she enjoyed being able to travel for her stories because it gave her range and experience when writing about each headline she was assigned. 

 This journey was no easy ride for Blye, though. At one point in her life she was sent to a mental institution. This changed her entirely. She spoke on the fact that while she was in there she felt she was sane compared to the others who surrounded her, but it also made her wonder if that is how others felt when looking at her. During her time in the institution, they were forced to share a bath towel 45 people/ 1 towel, the food was atrocious, she was held in confinement rooms that were rat-filled, damp, lonely, and intolerable, and worst of all she was beaten, dragged by her hair, held under water, and tied down. This mental institution did some serious damage on Nellie Blye. 

The mental institution scares did not stop her from her journalism work after the fact, though. She did not skip a beat coming back to this profession where she covered WW1 stories and happened to be the first one to enter the warzone to report on what was going on. This did not last as long as she had liked when she was arrested on the mistaken impression that she was a British spy. 

Blye was a woman willing to take many risks in her profession and this set a tone for not only female journalists, but males as well on how to get the best story no matter the consequence.

Winifred Sweet

Winifred Sweet

There is so much to know about Winifred Sweet. Whether the focus is upon her bravery, talent, creativity, determination, her name in general, or her impact on the world as a whole, there is no real way to focus upon just one aspect of her. She was a journalist, but she was also an author who had many book

published in her time of being a writer. 

To begin, Winifred was a female journalist back in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Her career held up for 50 years, showing just how successful she truly was. She was also known as a “Sob Sister”, which was a journalist who wrote human interest stories with sympathetic pathos. Very often she focused upon opinion writing, which had its advantages and disadvantages in the field. She passed away in 1936, but crazy enough she was working right up until her death. She had a piece published in The Examiner the week before she died. This was a clear indicator to everyone that she was the hardest worker you could find.

She spent much of her time working for the Chicago Tribune first and then her work moved to The Examiner. She was offered a position in New York as well, but this was working for her ex-husband.  She turned this offer down quickly, though it was a great opportunity, and moved to Colorado to continue her work instead.

There were not many successful women in journalism at this time. In fact, Winifred had to do some pretty crazy stunts and charades in order to be noticed or confirmed as successful. Her two craziest stunts were during the Hurricane of 1900 and her "Emergency Test". 

To start, her stunt during the Hurricane, or tidal wave, of 1900 was to dress as a young black man in order to ride upon the ship that brought her to the scene. Without this incredible disguise, she couldn’t have gotten onto the boat at all to report. Not only was she the only female reporter that was able to cover this story, she was also the very first reporter on the scene. This gave her quite a jump ahead of the others. As she approached the scene she was able to see the fires begin and in addition was first-hand experiencing the “deadliest natural disaster in American  history.” Interestingly enough though, her goal was not just to cover the full story of what was going on during this time. Her main goal overall was to raise money to relieve the damage that had been done. She also spent coverage time defending policemen and firemen claiming that they were doing their best in a situation that was so difficult to handle. She had hoped she could bring a more positive light to these people who were working so hard. 

As for her"Emergency Test", this was an even more in-depth stunt for her reporting. Within this story, she fake- fainted in front of a carriage. This drew lots of attention to her and ended with police sending her to the hospital. As this occurred, she was rudely treated by hospital workers (this was the norm for women whenever they were brought into the hospital, workers had never been kind to them). After her “drama”, she uncovered a large scandal and discovered many problems with emergency services. This stunt of hers brought a brand new respect to her name considering other reporters did not often go to these lengths to get to the bottom of a story. 

Winifred was incredibly passionate about her profession, which was what led her to do the incredible things she did. “I'd rather smell the printer's ink and hear the presses go around than go to any grand opera in the world.” She stated, explaining that her love for writing was stronger than anything else there was. This was a clear indicator of the type of person she was and the work ethic she was producing which makes it evident why she was such a phenomenon nationwide for so many years (even after her passing).