An American Allegory: Hysteria, Media Dissent and Good Night, and Good Luck

The rise of McCarthyism in mid-century USA is not only fascinating, but can be applied to many other eras in which fear and paranoia overtook reason. Anthony Carew looks at George Clooney's celebrated film in terms of the landscape in which it was made, as well as the one in which we currently find ourselves.

Additional keywords: Film as text, senior secondary, tertiary, cinema theory, US history, communism, Joseph McCarthy, Edward R Murrow, George W Bush, impartial media, media bias, journalism, reporting, CBS, network television.