Amc Looks At Reporters In Movies

Moviemakers haven’t done a good job of accurately portraying journalists over the years, according to American Movie Classics host Nick Clooney.

Having spent some 28 years as a broadcast journalist, Clooney, now a syndicated columnist, knows a thing or two about the news business. And he puts that knowledge to use in “Hollywood and the News,” a half-hour AMC special examining the fictional roles of reporters on the big screen (Tuesday night at 6:30).

For the report, Clooney - who, yes, is papa of “ER” star George Clooney - didn’t rely on just his own impressions. He sought insight from NBC’s Tom Brokaw, ABC’s Diane Sawyer and Barbara Walters, CNN’s Bernard Shaw and CBS’ Dan Rather, who all appear on the show.

“Our problem is we don’t tell people what we do for a living. We allow movies and tabloid TV shows to do that. We allow them to define what we do,” Clooney sums up.

“There’s nobody out there telling people what journalists do. Maybe that’s not a good movie (one about real journalists). Maybe it’s boring.”

According to Clooney, three of the five news stars interviewed for the special said they felt the 1976 film, “All The President’s Men,” starring Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford as Washington Post Watergate reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, offered the best depiction of journalists.

“That was a newsroom we recognized,” he said.