State of Play

It’s refreshing to see a dutifully old-fashioned political thriller, complete with Russell Crowe as the hardscrabble, unshaven, whiskey-drinking reporter poised to save the day. The cast is all good, the plot is compelling, and it’s adequately suspenseful. But the most memorable thing of all is the end credit montage: following newspapers through the printing process. It proves that when something’s in print, you have to stand behind it. It can’t be “refreshed.” It signals the slow death of newspapers, and unfortunately, the journalism of due diligence.