By Evan Ferstenfeld

George Clooney, the man who ruled the NBC roost for half a decade with little more than a Caesar haircut and well-chiseled stethoscope, clearly despises current television. This is hardly a radical stance for the once small-tube behemoth to broadcast, now that he has moved on to Tom Hanks/Brad Pitt/Random Celebrity Scientologist stature on the big screen. What is most shocking is that he has such a cogent argument against the state of network intellectual desolation, born from a story that takes place in the 1950's, an era of TV where the laughter heard on sitcoms wasn't faked and leggy pouches of chewing tobacco high-stepped their way into every nuclear family's living room.

Wiping from his canvas the psychedelic whirlwind of outrageous facts with only slightly more outrageous fictions in his 2002 directorial debut Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, Clooney instead leans almost exclusively on documented occurrences for Good Night, and Good Luck. Visually showcasing its right vs. wrong thematics, the black-and-white look of the film perfectly matches the 50's mindset and its citizen's need to blend in with bland attire, sterile interiors and the tensions between two superpowers to rid the world of one other. Irrational fears of a Communist invasion nesting inside our nation led Senator Joseph McCarthy and others to spray paint red anyone with a nose for change. David Strathairn plays the venerable Edward R. Murrow, a pioneering network muckraker for radio and then CBS television, whose high-minded ideals and cojones of steel paved the way for McCarthy's eventual public splattering.

Strathairn already gives off the appearance of a winged bird of prey waiting for its future meal's final gasp to escape, which Clooney uses to superior effect to highlight Murrow's intellectual precision. The effect of this has Murrow's televised re-creations playing the part of the bookworm bully, pinning you to your seat with an all-knowing stare and shaking you down for loose modes of thought, armed with a switchblade of knowledge. Robert Downey Jr. works well with this seasoned and well-matched cast, and Jeff Daniels and Frank Langella dutifully inhabit the constipated corporate nature of their positions at the CBS network, rewarding us with awkward acting gold.

It's hard to view the timeliness of Good Luck's moral lessons on due process, and journalistic fearlessness to properly educate the public as mere coincidence. Is this film a snap-shot biography of a man dousing the filthy rags of intolerance with his educated verbal liter fluid, igniting the fire that topples an evil mindset and pleads for our country to once again break out the matches? Is it merely an elaborately arty excuse for Clooney and his Hollywood cronies to again call out the current administration's all-purpose explanation for invasion of privacy in terrorism as McCarthy cited Communism? At times, Good Luck seems to become the souped-up moral equivalent of a Jerry Springer Final Thought, all hopefully pious preaching on topics that have already been dissected with more flair and far-reaching appeal (1976's Network, which Clooney is prepping a live televised re-tinkering of).

Even with a theme in search of a viable film to sync up with and doling out lessons that have probably schooled you before, you have seldom had such a convincing teacher on its many important subjects. In fact, Good Night, and Good Luck is a lot like Murrow himself - intensely direct, sticks to its guns and asks you to ponder over the larger questions it leaves unanswered, perhaps because the answers are even further away and cloudier than when Murrow first posed them.

Grade: B-
Rating: PG
Running Time: 93 Mins.