As you may have heard, these are hard times for the journalism business. Newspapers are biting the dust left and right. My own paper's ownership has filed for bankruptcy. Ditto for the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times and other media groups. Even the New York Times is battening down the hatches.
When I visited the Dodger Stadium press box the other day, a lofty perch once full to the brim with sportswriters, the joint looked like a bar on the day after St. Patrick's Day.
So why does Hollywood keep making movies about newspapermen? The short answer is that Hollywood loves a good yarn. For much of its 100-plus-year history, whenever Hollywood has portrayed journalists, it seems to have taken the advice of the frontier newspaper editor in John Ford's "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance," who said: "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."
The maxim is certainly alive today, as is evidenced by two new films that revolve around journalists. This past weekend saw the arrival of "State of Play," which stars Russell Crowe as a freewheeling investigative reporter ensnared in a nasty web of Washington intrigue and conflict of interest. Due this Friday is "The Soloist," which features Robert Downey Jr. playing The Times' own Steve Lopez, a newspaper columnist who finds himself intertwined in an equally complicated relationship with a homeless musician, a relationship inspired by a series of columns Lopez wrote for our paper in 2005.
Neither movie is expected to be a big hit. "State of Play," which cost close to $65 million, opened to a mediocre $14.1 million this weekend. "The Soloist" (originally slated for release last fall) cost less, is more realistic and might do slightly better at the box office. But both films feel a bit like curios in an era of sci-fi fantasies and superhero adventure extravaganzas.
I say that with sadness because it was a movie -- or more accurately, a series of movies -- that made me want to be a journalist. When I was in film school, we were bombarded with all sorts of rakish visions of newspaper life, including "Nothing Sacred," "His Girl Friday," "Sweet Smell of Success" and "All the President's Men." Even in the darker, more cynical renditions of the world, like Billy Wilder's "Ace in the Hole," you knew being a reporter was where the action was.
