In the film All the President’s Men, journalists are presented as heroes who save the country from a corrupt politician. In the film Absence of Malice, a journalist is shown to be more complex. Megan Carter is not a hero. She is almost a villain because of the negative effects she has on the lives of an innocent man, Michael Gallagher, and his friend, Teresa. In the film’s final scene, Megan defends the profession of journalism but she admits she didn’t do her job very well. I think that’s one of the main points of the film, that journalists are human beings who try to do good by revealing the truth but sometimes make mistakes which can hurt people very badly. Megan’s editor, Mac, also said that he “knows how to be a good reporter” and he “knows how not to hurt people” but he doesn’t know how to do both things at the same time.
Besides Megan, another character who doesn’t do his job well is Elliot Rosen, the investigator for the Justice Department. After six months of a frustrating search for the killer of a union leader, Rosen decides to use a method of investigation which eventually backfires on him and causes him to be fired in the end. Rosen reminded me a little bit of J.J. Hunsecker from The Sweet Smell of Success, because he is someone who wants to get something difficult done but uses someone else to do his dirty work. Hunsecker used the press agent Falco to try to break up his sister’s relationship with a musician. In Absence of Malice, Rosen gets Megan to write a story about Gallagher to try to get Gallagher to provide information on the murder. Megan becomes Rosen’s tool. That is another big point that the film tries to make — that the media can become tools of the government if journalists are not careful in how they do their jobs.
Mari
