On holiday at the moment, I’ve been catching up with movies I’ve missed, including ‘State of Play’ a political/media thriller built around a collaboration between an old school MSM investigative reporter and a blogger working for the same newspaper in Washington.
Behind the main story about dirty dealings in the privatised defence industry is a snapshot of the new tensions between the conventional media and the new media worlds. This is dramatised in this case in the relationship between Russell Crowe’s character, Cal Macaffrey a grizzled and cynical newspaper reporter and Rachel McAdams’ entertainment blogger.
The editor, played by Helen Mirren, is caught between the increasingly strident commercial demands of her conglomerate publisher (‘MediaCorp’) and her editorial instincts. The way the wind is blowing is evident in the fact that McAdams’ character has a state-of-the-art fully integrated workstation, while Crowe’s old school journalist plugs away on a decrepit 486.
Anyway, for anyone wanting an escapist version of the MSM vs Blogging wars we are experiencing in Australia, it’s highly recommended.
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