Ink Recalls Tabloid Start for the Murdoch Media Empire

Globally, we have seen traditional newspaper outlets shutter. Institutions that have been around long before most of us were born and yet The Sun newspaper is still going strong with print and digital editions thanks the initial vision of media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

In November 1969, the London establishment-ruled media, centered on the iconic Fleet Street, was a hotbed of betrayal, backstabbing and bad behavior. Lamb (Jack O’ Connell) and Murdoch (Guy Pearce) took a different approach, publishing editions of The Sun loaded with lurid headlines, outlandish
puns and covering everything from sports to television to sex. Their pushing of ethical concerns to the sidelines revolutionized the media landscape into a succession of media firsts altering the trajectory of today’s 24/7,
clickbait, social media news landscape, while taking Lamb and Murdoch down a dark path.

Directed by by Academy Award–winning director Danny Boyle with a screenplay from James Graham, whose original stage play Ink won awards on both sides of the Atlantic, this is not just a film about two men.  It is a cautionary tale of what and how power can erode from the inside out.

Opening on a pixelated, nearly cartoon like image of Murdoch and Lamb, quickly focusing into color sets up the ride and message that nothing in journalism is just black and white. The ranges of colors and possibilities of how media can be ingested and delivered will always ebb and flow until it doesn’t.

Focusing on the the seemingly unethical methods in which journalists were poached for a startup was fascinating in itself, as well as, the ongoing war between British vs Australian journalists.  Not to mention, how rare it was (and still is by today’s standards) to see more than one woman in the newsroom.

“I felt there was a thread,” Boyle says,“from that moment [when The Sun was bought by Murdoch], through my history, and the history of this country, to where we’ve arrived today. Not just in the way that the mechanics of the tech world make us behave, but also understanding that we are part of that behavior, and responsible for it as well. We can’t just blame technology for it. We have to accept some responsibility for it ourselves. And this seemed to me to be a place where, if you could ever pick a starting point, this was it for me.”

In the film, Lamb asks journalist Jules Davies (Claire Foy) what the public wants from their news. “It shouldn’t be a mirror,” Davies tells him.
“We don’t want to just see ourselves. That’s the last thing I wanted to see, growing up. It’s a window. You get to look out. I did. From my
home, my little town. You get the whole world delivered to you. All the most powerful, richest people in the land, being written about and shared, with me. Accountable. For my judgment.”

It’s that repositioning of the news, from “mirror” to “window,” that made The Sun such a breakaway success starting in the ’70s. That and the fact that its manifesto, instilled by Lamb and his team, was to “entertain as well as educate.”

The cast is superb, led by the magnificent Jack O’Connell, Guy Pearce and Claire Foy collectively and separately bring you in with just a gaze or a slight physical gesture that speaks volumes. Yet, I was mostly reeled in by Foy, whose fictionalized character  Jules Davies, blends of some of the groundbreaking women journalists of the era. When she reaches her breaking point with how far she will go sweeping her journalistic integrity under the rug, I wanted to stand and cheer at her courage to take a stance and ultimately saving herself.

Boyle’s kinetic sense of cinematic style will take you out for a minute, but when the pacing clicks back in it goes full throttle making you appreciate this filmmaker has never bent down to the status quo – much like the subjects his films center around.

One of my favorite moments was the carousel of Sun headlines over the decades very simply illustrating how it became the best selling newspaper in the world.  Yet, that type of success always comes at a cost.  Ink is more than a film about the early beginnings of Rupert Murdoch and and his meteoric ascension later on with Fox News.  It’s a sordid tale of inspiration, aspiration and a candid look at just how far one will go for a headline.