Wednesday, June 19, 2013. Last Update: Wed 6:00 PM EST

Critical Eye

Ace in the Hole (1951)

What a sixty-year-old noir can tell us about the Murdoch hacking scandal

I’ve got Murdoch on the brain, but I couldn’t help thinking about the News of the World scandal while watching... More

Searching for D.B. Cooper

Geoffrey Gray joins the hunt for the vanishing bandit

Skyjack: The Hunt for D.B. Cooper| By Geoffrey Gray | Crown | 302 pages, $25.00 In the winter of 1971,... More

Your Summer Movie Picks

Journalism-themed films recommended by CJR’s readers

Through these difficult times for journalism we could all use a little inspiration and a little fun. How about a... More

Almost Famous (2000)

Who’s afraid of Rolling Stone?

Beware, beware, Rolling Stone magazine... Music, inarguably, is the hero, the emotional engine in Almost Famous, the Cameron Crowe-written, -directed... More

The Big Clock (1948)

A murderous publisher’s corporate noir

The Big Clock begins, as all stories about a desperate journalist ought to, with a drunken night. Charles Stroud, a... More

Absence of Malice (1981)

When bad journalism kills

When I was a student in journalism school, in the beginning of my first semester, one of the professors of... More

The Year of Living Dangerously (1982)

A group of hollow career fetishists and a moralizing dwarf

At the 1983 Academy Awards, a four-foot-nine dynamo of a New York stage actress named Linda Hunt took home the... More

Q&A: Sebastian Junger on Tim Hetherington

“The ultimate truth about war is that you are guaranteed to lose your brothers.”

It’s not often that one sees characters from a film gather to mourn a filmmaker. On May 24, soldiers from... More

Superman

The Man of Steel has better things to do than be a reporter

When watching Superman (1978), I was reminded of the David Carradine rant from the end of Kill Bill: Vol. 2,... More

The Devil Wears Prada

The first entry in CJR’s summer movie club

The Devil Wears Prada is a film that exists two beats apart from reality. At least. Based on the book... More

Mad Men: Jon Ronson’s The Psychopath Test

A travelogue of insanity with the author of Them

The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through The Madness Industry | by Jon Ronson | Riverhead | 288 pages, $25.95 Jon... More

Memoirs of an Accidental Sportswriter

Robert Lipsyte’s new memoir recounts fifty years on the sports pages

An Accidental Sportswriter | by Robert Lipsyte | Ecco | 256 pages, $25.99 Robert Lipsyte’s An Accidental Sportswriter doesn’t leave... More

Tabloid City and the Contours of Emptiness

Pete Hamill’s new novel explores a city in decline

Tabloid City | by Pete Hamill | Little, Brown and Company | 288 pages, $26.99 In the opening pages of... More

Q&A: Calvin Trillin

“I think journalists make a mistake writing about more than one person at a time”

Trillin on Texas | by Calvin Trillin | University of Texas Press | 184 pages, $22.00 Last month, long-time New... More

Anatomy of a Journalist

Janet Malcolm dissects a murder trial, and her own profession

Iphigenia in Forest Hills: Anatomy of a Murder Trial | by Janet Malcolm | Yale University Press | 168 pages,... More

Missing Michael Hastings

One of the great reporters of his generation died Tuesday at 33. The stories he wrote, and the ones he didn’t live to write

Michael Hastings: my friend and his enemies

Hastings was fearless and shook things up - especially with his McChrystal expose. The haters in the media couldn’t forgive him

Snowden versus the dragons

Journalism is about finding flaws and magnifying them, and surely someone who would spill massive loads of state secrets must contain a few broken parts, right?

Call it the Politico rhetorical crutch

The inside-the-beltway publication’s go-to phrase

Rachel Maddow’s tribute to Michael Hastings

“Michael was angry … he was angry about things that weren’t right in the world. He was angry with war and with loss, and that drove his reporting.”

  • If you like the magazine, get the rest of the year for just $19.95 (6 issues in all).
  • If not, simply write cancel on the bill and return it. You will owe nothing.

Who Owns What

The Business of Digital Journalism

A report from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism

Study Guides

Questions and exercises for journalism students.