(no subject)

[jfb]

I really enjoyed Shattered Glass, the movie about Stephen Glass, who fabricated dozens of articles for The New Republic in the mid-90s. It covers a couple of my favorite topics--journalism and lying--and is itself interestingly journalistic in tone. The DVD commentary track, featuring director Billy Ray and Chuck Lane, Glass's editor, is also great. The movie doesn't claim to be non-fiction--there are composite characters and made-up dialogue--but it tracks real-life events closely enough that the commentators slip back and forth between talking about actors, characters, and the real people on which they're based. At several points Ray asks Lane to talk about "what you were thinking during this conversation," and it's a conversation that really happened, so it's a question that actually makes sense.

Comments

on my list

[talking-sock.livejournal.com]

Maybe I'll move it up the list. It's interesting that an account of the lying journalist would be handled as a docu-drama, yet remain factual enough for that kind of crossover in their discussion.

Re: on my list

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Yeah. One of the things that makes the commentary so fascinating is that it's clear the director--who also wrote the screenplay--really did approach it as a work of journalism, fact-checking his story with multiple sources etc., even though to make it a movie he had to make up dialogue and dramatize scenes and such. (Not always, though: Some dialogue is taken directly from transcripts that the real-life subjects kept because, duh, they're journalists.) So the desire for accuracy is there on a meta level--as is the question of fabrication. There's one cut--they point it out in the commentary--that made me dizzy, it was so great.

Re: on my list

[(Anonymous)]

"There's one cut--they point it out in the commentary--that made me dizzy, it was so great."

Since I just saw it recently (including the commentary track)--which cut/scene? I can't remember.

-B

[bnewmark.livejournal.com]

i had no idea there was a film out about him, although his book, the fabulist, has been on my to-read list for a while now.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

I read a bunch of stuff about the book when it came out--mostly by outraged journalists. Columns like Jack Shafer's (http://slate.msn.com/id/2091015) didn't make me want to read the book itself. But maybe it's good.

[bnewmark.livejournal.com]

interesting review. here's the thing - as a journalist, it's probably near impossible to look at the book (and the subject) objectively, which i fully understand. so, my feeling is, even though i don't necessarily thing he should profit from his unethical actions, it does sound like an entertaining story.

[bnewmark.livejournal.com]

by the way, have you read today's paper yet? i think you'll find this amusing - i did! http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/11/weekinreview/11boro.html

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Just got back from reading (most of) it. I liked the "If anything happened to you while serving a second term" one.