Power of the Press (1943)

Power of the Press: Directed by Lew Landers. With Guy Kibbee, Lee Tracy, Gloria Dickson, Otto Kruger. During WWII, the publisher of the isolationist New York Gazette is murdered just as he was about to change the paper’s policy and support the US war effort. His friend, a small town patriotic editor, is brought in to find the culprits.

“You know, it sure seems that the more films I see from the 1930s u0026amp; 40s, the more Iu0026#39;m becoming convinced that this so-called u0026quot;Golden Ageu0026quot; of movies was, in fact, not as u0026quot;goldenu0026quot; as some people would like to imagine it to be.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eYes. Iu0026#39;ll agree that there were certainly some real gems from that particular era of film-making – But, what Iu0026#39;m beginning to discover is that for every precious gem that is so fondly remembered, there remains a literal quarry full of nothing but ordinary stones and pebbles that would best be ground up into gravel.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIn other words – The mediocre u0026amp; forgettable b-movies of those days of yesteryear definitely out-number the gold by, at least, 10 to 1. I ainu0026#39;t kidding here.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003ePower Of The Press was, in its own way, something of a dramatic social commentary. Its story concerned the political machinery behind honest, fair-minded news-reporting, as opposed to the denial of freedom of speech through selling the gullible public narrow-minded bias and manipulative propaganda.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eUnfortunately, this rather run-of-the-mill picture lacked conviction and a substantial enough bite to its seemingly dire message.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI suppose that a lot of this pictureu0026#39;s mediocrity could be rightfully blamed on the u0026quot;Hayes Codeu0026quot; (which was in full-force at the time). This vicious, self-righteous censor board trampled on hundreds of well-meaning movies from this era and, pretty much, reduced them to their pitiful toothless state.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003ePower Of The Press (which had a running time of only 64 minutes) was directed by Lew Landers who churned out dozens of low-budget movies throughout the 1930s u0026amp; 40s.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eLanders died in 1962 at the age of 61.”