I watched “All The President’s Men” for the first time last week and it’s safe to say that more than 3o years after its release the film is still a classic.

Actually, I think it is the best Hollywood representation of life as a newspaper reporter. Prior to seeing “All The President’s Men” I thought the Michael Keaton/Robert Duvall film “The Paper” was the best journo flick to hit the big screen. I was wrong.

While watching Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford track down the details of the Watergate scandal in the offices of The Washington Post I couldn’t help but think of how much things have changed in the journalism industry during the past four decades.

First, there’s what you’re reading now, a blog. It’s hard to imagine the sort of in-depth, secretive, investigative reporting Woodward and Bernstein did on such a massive national story happening during the blog era without the story being leaked before it went to press.

Secondly, less than thirty years ago every newsroom used typewriters to get the paper out every day. I haven’t used a typewriter in 20 years and I’ve never used one in a newsroom. I can’t even fathom what The World’s newsroom would be like if we were all using typewriters today. Maybe it would look something like this.
However, I will admit that while watching the movie I yearned to be transported back to a 70s newsroom when I heard all the dinging of typewriters and loud clicking of typewriter keys in the newsroom. It is my dorky journalistic equivalent to wanting to be transported back to the 60s every time I listen to a Beatles record so I can feel the social impact of the music in context.

Anyway, there are several other references to the way things were back in the day (smoking in the newsroom, no computers, an editorial board of nothing but old, white men) that were interesting to catch from a reporter’s point of view. I was almost as fascinated by those things as I was the movie itself.

It was also nice to see my profession somewhat accurately portrayed on film. Some of the techniques Hoffman and Redford used in the film (getting access to a reluctant source’s home by asking for a cigarette, asking to take notes in the middle of a conversation) are real life investigative journalism tricks I actually learned from this guy in college.

Journalistic observations aside, the movie is a really, really good film. I recommend “All The Presidents Men” to anyone who enjoys good acting, a solid story and wants to learn a little bit of American history to boot.

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