Documentary | 09 April 2002

Once the drama inherent in screenwriter Carl Foreman's story moves from an intro to his career beginnings and what he put on the page into what he was obliged to maneuver personally and professionally in the shark-infested waters of McCarthyism, leading to his HUAC summons, his resilient defiance of pressures to capitulate, and then exile to London as the only alternative to prison, just for refusing to "name names," this documentary takes on a riveting power of an all-too-relevant tale of free speech, civil liberties, and coercive intrigue in the name of pseudo-patriotism and feels like fresh insight despite the many looks into the blacklist era in both docu and drama over recent decades.