Shattered Glass

Starring: Hayden Christensen, Rosario Dawson

RS: 3of 4 Stars Average User Rating: 3of 4 Stars

2003 Drama

The true story of a lying reporter is told like a journalistic thriller no one stopped the presses when writer Stephen Glass fabricated stories for The New Republic, Harper's, George and Rolling Stone. It took a while to figure him out and fire his ass. Shattered Glass, written by first-time director Billy Ray, from a Vanity Fair article by Buzz Bissinger, covers Glass' tenure at The New Republic from 1995 to 1998, with marked parallels to the more recent fabrications of Jayson Blair at the New York Times. It makes for a scarily compelling thriller that puts journalistic ethics on trial.

Hayden Christensen, a wooden George Lucas puppet in the last two Star Wars fizzles, is sensational as Glass, finding the wonder boy and the weasel in a disturbed kid flying high on a fame he hasn't earned. Glass charms the staff at The New Republic, including writer Caitlin Avey (Chloe Sevigny) and editor Michael Kelly (Hank Azaria). It is under new editor Charles Lane (Peter Sarsgaard) that Glass unravels. Adam Penenberg (Steve Zahn) and other writers at Forbes Digital Tool find the holes in Glass' reporting, leading Lane to uncover falsehoods in twenty-seven of Glass' forty-one articles.

Director Ray calls his movie a "little brother to All the President's Men." It's a fair assessment. Glass breaks out in a cold sweat, and you will, too, when Lane takes him to the places he described in one article and rubs his nose in his lies. Sarsgaard (Boys Don't Cry) makes a devastating impression, finding the steel of principle in the starchy Lane. The film never digs deep enough into the pressures on Glass from his family, his peers and himself to achieve psychological depth. But as an inside look into the hothouse of journalism, it's dynamite.

PETER TRAVERS
(October 23, 2003)