‘Deadline’ delivers: Humphrey Bogart is the Superman of movie newspaper editors

I remember seeing that classic first “modern” Superman movie back in first grade. Seven-year-old me couldn’t have cared less about the big-time director and A-list cast that included Marlon Brando, Margot Kidder, Gene Hackman and some newcomer named Christopher Reeve.

Nope, this was all about seeing a superhero from a small town in Kansas. As far as I was concerned, this was a story about my people.

On the drive home after the movie, we all talked about our favorite parts. In some ways, this was the best part of going to the movies: discussing all of the details with my little buddies.

All the plot points were discussed, the jokes retold and the fight scenes discussed with almost joy. “What was your favorite part, Robbi?” I didn’t even have to think about it.

“That Superman was really a newspaper reporter.”

The elementary school version of me thought Superman was a journalism movie. That explains a lot, right?

Fast forward to present day.

I still love movies about newspapers. And I totally love talking about them. With fairly recent big-time movies like “Spotlight” and “The Post,” Hollywood seems to have taken an interest in journalism movies again. Talk to most who work in a newsroom, and they’ll admit these flicks are a little like a reporter’s version of “Rocky.”

All of the tedious research is like Stallone working out like a madman to an ’80s rock soundtrack, and when the Italian Stallion eventually knocks out the unbeatable champion after 15 tedious rounds – that’s totally the equivalent of the truth saving the day in a newspaper movie.

One of the questions I get asked way more often than you think is what I think is the best newspaper movie of all time?

That’s easy.

And it’s a movie most people – even journalists – have never even heard of, let alone seen: “Deadline-U.S.A.” starring Humphrey Bogart and Ethel Barrymore. The wild part is that this 1952 movie has way more in common with the newspapers of 2020 than even seems possible.

Well, except for that whole part about the newspaper’s editor being Bogart. We’re way off on that one.

Sure, the paper’s newsroom technology is way different, we don’t wear suits and ties to work, and I’ve never been in a newsroom that has a petty cash fund with the kind of discretionary use we see in this film – but that’s all part of its charm. Also, I’ve never heard or seen an editor hold a phone in the air while the newspaper is being printed and say, “That’s the press, baby,” while taunting the bad guy.

But I’d love to. And if it were me, I’d try to say it just like Bogart does.

There’s also a newsroom fight that is later described by the newpaper’s sports editor in the coolest way possible. It makes me giggle every time. And though I’ve seen tension-filled moments of raised voices – OK, let’s call it yelling – between reporters and editors in a newsroom, it’s hard to remember any actual punches being thrown.

All of that being said, “Deadline-U.S.A.’s” core themes hold up remarkably well for a movie that’s had its AARP membership for nearly 20 years.

At its heart, this movie is about the differences between a family-owned newspaper and a newspaper owned by a large chain. “Deadline-U.S.A.” was written and directed by Richard Brooks, who would eventually be nominated for eight Oscars, including winning the Academy Award for best adapted screenplay in 1960 for his work on “Elmer Gantry.”

Brooks loved newspapers and even studied journalism at Temple. He wrote for several large-market newspapers that are, coincidentally, mostly all closed after mergers with other papers. When he wrote the screenplay for “Deadline-U.S.A.,” he knew the subject matter all too well.

The movie takes place at a fictional newspaper – the Day – which is very much modeled after the New York Sun. The Sun’s longtime editor was Benjamin Day, with Brooks naming his movie’s paper after the influential editor. The movie also is loosely based upon the New York World, which in 1931 was sold by the sons of Joseph Pulitzer who no longer wanted to run it themselves.

That’s essentially what happens, as well, in “Deadline-U.S.A.,” as the deceased publisher’s children no longer want to run the Day and instead want to sell it to a chain – effectively killing the paper. Bogart’s character eloquently explains in multiple ways throughout the move how if this newspaper is sold to a larger group, it will end up looking just like all of its competitors, only with the name of the Day at the top.

He explains how terrible it will be for his hometown to have fewer journalists chasing the stories that are very much needed for the public good. The movie is filled with reporters worried about losing their jobs and having no idea what they’d do next, as well as talented colleagues leaving the industry for a different profession with more stability.

At one point early in the movie, Bogart is at a bar with many from the newsroom as they hold a wake for their about-to-be-sold newspaper. When it’s time for Bogart to talk, he openly wonders if their newspaper would have had a better chance of surviving if he had allowed it to have comics, puzzles and horoscopes. (Yes, those things haven’t always been a staple of local newspapers.)

It’s a perfect illustration of the tension between the need to provide readers with what they want in order for them to get what they need. He questions whether he could have done more to help his newspaper grow its readers in order to help further its founder’s original mission.

While all of this is happening in the background, a story about an immigrant’s daughter who had become a powerful mobster’s mistress ends up dead, giving the Day its last big story.

Without giving away an ending that would never make it into today’s cineplexes, the movie’s climax involves the dead woman’s mother deciding that justice for her daughter is more likely if she turns to the newspaper she’s read since coming to America, the Day, instead of going to the police first.

She explains how the newspaper taught her about the community, explained the culture and nuances of the area, the role of government and how to best live her life in her new home. She explains why she trusts the newspaper even more than she does the city’s officials and that she knows the Day can help get her daughter’s truth be told.

It’s a powerful moment that shows the close relationship between a newspaper and its readers. That’s why it’s my favorite journalism movie.

There are so many newspaper movies that I love and watch and watch again, but “Deadline-U.S.A.” was the first I’d seen that seemed to make all of the points and problems of the newspapers I had worked at even though it was nearly 70 years old. More importantly, it showed that newspapers really are about helping people in ways you’re not taught in any college class.

Plus, it has Humphrey Bogart as the editor, who is every bit as cool as Superman was to the 7-year-old me.