Doesn't George Clooney make you sick? Not only does he make acting appear ridiculously easy, but he looks like that and he makes Oscar-nominated movies like this.

The follow-up to his well-received directorial debut Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind (the sort-o'-biography of quiz show host Chuck Barris) is another, much truer story from the early days of American television.

In the Soviet-shunning 1950s, broadcaster Ed Murrow could be relied upon to show the utmost professionalism whether he was delivering the hardest-hitting news story or asking Liberace when he was going to settle down with a nice girl.

So when he and his producer Fred Friendly (Clooney) hear that a pilot suspected of Communist links has been hounded out of the navy based on little more than rumour, they throw themselves into discrediting the accusers.

But these are just military monkeys; Murrow wants to go after the organ-grinder. By exposing McCarthy for the lying fear-monger that he is, he hopes to quell the anti-'Red' hysteria with some much-needed honesty.

Barely a word is wasted as the Murrow-McCarthy face-off provides the drama in an admirably lean script from Clooney and co-writer Grant Heslov (who also takes a minor role).

They should be applauded for taking the brave decision to get down to brass tacks and omit personal details from the main protagonists' lives.

What is clear is that this was a time when smoking in the newsroom was practically mandatory. Clooney may have broken the record for the number of tabs smoked in a single film, a fact that he slyly acknowledges.

And the hazy, black-and-white cinematography is more than just an exercise in style. It ensures that the absorbing archive footage blends seamlessly into proceedings to capture the mood of the time.

The wonderfully subtle Strathairn imbues Murrow with integrity and a world-weariness that comes from perpetually fighting against a tide of ignorance and lies.

His performance of a true patriot reflects the film itself: calm, focused and committed.

With propaganda still being a boom industry, it would have been nice to see Murrow make mincemeat of today’s nanny states in general and the anti-smoking brigade in particular. Unfortunately, he died of lung cancer.

Elliott Noble