The Official Shattered Glass Discussion Thread

Sound awesome, thanks Geo!

 

I just listened to the audit commentary from Billy Ray and Chuck Lane and it was very interesting. I love hearing how a movie comes together, from the script to the lighting to the sets to how the actor felt that day. However, the commentary was especially interesting when you hear the actual person, Chuck Lane in this case, who is played on film give the commentary and say this really happened or this is what I was feeling at that moment..kind of chilling and a testament to the care and dedication Billy Ray put into the film.

Makes me love the movie even more!!!! I love that Billy's favorite Hayden shot is my favorite as well..at the end, when he's confronted by his lies and the camera shows a close-up of his face..the emotions in his eyes and facial movements...what a moment for Hayden!

 

Just watched it on DVD.

Brilliant work by all involved. The comparison to All The President's Men is quite apt.

The hardest part about watching it was trying not to feel sympathetic to the Glass character simply because Hayden was portraying him. Watching the 60 Minutes interviewe in the DVD supplements cleared that up. What a slimeball.

-Otis

 

Oh, yes, what a remorseless, callow little slimeball he is, indeed....and one thing I noticed all the more when I watched that 60 Minutes interview - and *really* wanted to just smack him *silly* as I watched it, I was plainly seething outright - is how soft-spoken he is, certainly, as a general thing....that's the very carefully-cultivated persona and demeanour that he conveys....but take note of the fact that whenever he's directly called on just how hurtful and destructive his actions were, he immediately gets all timid-voiced and self-effacing, prattling on about how, oh, yes, he *did* do some very awful things, truly awful, indefensible....but his whole attitude, that entire time, is one of the chastened little boy who acts all downcast and pleading just to get some blasted *sympathy*. It's a *pity* act, and nothing more! Look at it this way....typically, if someone comes up to you and is admitting in this very soft and timid voice about what awful things they've done....what usually happens?

Typical response to it seems to be that, as likely as not, a person will just reassure them and say something like, no, no, it's okay....or even "it's not your fault" or "it doesn't make you a bad person"....and it's casual, offhand reassurances like *that* which Stephen Glass only feeds on like a little parasite. He *uses* such usually-natural, innate societal responses to his benefit....he exploits and manipulates using them so skillfully that before one knows it, he's successfully managed to twist *everyone* around his little finger. He's a schemer and ultimate deceiver, and uses the well-intentioned goodwill of others for his own warped benefit and aims....and the worst of it is, perhaps - that whenever he *does* get so small-voiced, little-boy shy about it....such as in always asking "Are you mad at me?" and "Did I do something wrong?", ad *nauseum* - of course other people buy into it....because he's a master deceiver, a charmer and a liar....*period*.

And it's also obvious that he has absolutely *no* real care or remorse for his actions, much less for how much he hurt his friends and former co-workers, who were so ready and willing to jump right to his defense....they stood behind him pretty much the whole way, until it was all blown right apart - and he only repaid their trust and loyalty with deceit, manipulation, and treachery. Witness how he has *never* once said "I'm sorry", never truly offered *any* expression of genuine regret or remorse like that....though of course, as Chuck Lane and others have said, even if Stephen *did* try to play that particular card - they wouldn't buy a word of it. *Couldn't*, of course, after what he's done....and still perpetuates, to this very day. The only thing Stephen Glass is "sorry" for is that he ever got *caught*. Lying, snivelling little weasel.... *growls darkly*


Dawn. (no, honestly, how do I *really* feel, right?)

 

My husband watched it with me and liked it, and afterward we watched the "60 Minutes" interview. My sentiments exactly--what a WORM! It's so plainly obvious that the only thing he's sorry for is that he GOT CAUGHT! In fact, in a way he almost seems proud of himself. He's really, really sickening, and I don't feel the least bit sorry for him.

Also--wouldn't it be a hell of a lot easier just to, oh, I don't know, actually do the work?!?!? Seriously, as much effort as he put into backing up his lies, he could have gone out and written half a dozen fantastic stories.

What a simp.

 

I had the same reaction to Stephen Glass on the 60 Minutes excerpt. What a manipulative creep.

Given all of the above, didn't Hayden do a great job? I watched it with my husband as well, and halfway through the film my normally mild-mannered spouse was shouting, "Fire him! Just fire him!"

 

I rented the movie today. I am actually glad I didn't buy it, because this is not a movie I want to see multiple times.

Not because it's bad. Because it's painful. It's painful to watch this duplicitous weasel lie and betray everyone, then lie his way out of the lies, literally making up stuff off the top of his head, and manipulate people to the point where it takes being smacked upside the head, almost literally, for them to see through him.

Like Otis_Frampton said, I found myself sliding into sympathy for Stephen Glass, because Hayden was playing him. Even though I knew better, I kept hoping he'd come clean, admit he lied, apologize to the people he duped, and go back to work for The New Republic, this time as a good, honest journalist. Then I stopped myself, and thought, "If Hayden really captured this guy, whoa, no wonder he got away with it for so long." The real Stephen Glass is not as cherubic-looking as Hayden, but I can easily see him turning on the wounded-puppy act once he knows he's caught, then getting all teary and pseudo-suicidal, saying, "I can't be alone, I don't know what I'm going to do to myself."

Just as with Anakin Skywalker, Hayden obviously did his homework with this role. He nails Glass's mannerisms and personality, his self-congratulatory smugness, and his panic as he realizes the jig is up. The movie takes a different route than most movies about real people: it portrays the subject as neither a saint nor as a monster. And it very admirably takes no political stance whatsoever, even though the events occur around the time of Bill and Monica, and one of the stories Glass fabricates concerns "young conservatives."

Peter Sarsgaard is also terrific as Chuck Lane. He's just as a regular fellow, who is as angry with himself for being taken in by Glass as he is with Glass. He is not cruel at all; in his position, I'm sure many people would've been tempted to humiliate Glass by firing him in front of the whole office, to really rub it in when they question Glass at the end, listing the titles of his stories. But he doesn't. Perhaps not surprisingly, the real Chuck Lane in the "60 Minutes" piece, which is one of the DVD's few extras, isn't all thundering indignation and fiery condemnations either. His assessment of Glass is, all things considered, downright mild: "If it was sunny outside and Steve" (interesting that he still calls him "Steve") "and I were both standing outside in the sun and Steve came to me and said, 'It's a sunny day,' I would immediately go check with two other people to make sure it was a sunny day," says Lane.

I agree that the real Stephen Glass feels no remorse. He lacked the courage and common decency to apologize to his colleagues in person (the same colleagues who, as Dawn pointed out, leaped to his defense, protected him, stood up for him up until the very end), instead going on public television, oh-so-conveniently around the same time his roman a clef novel had come out. His "coming clean" is more of a self-serving ploy to get people to trust him again, rather than a true mea culpa.

 

Forgive me if someone has already listed this, but I found a review of "Shattered Glass" by David Plotz, one of Stephen Glass's former friends. Plotz's wife, Hanna Rosin, was one of Glass's colleagues at The New Republic, and the real-life basis for Chloe Sevigny's character Caitlin Avey.

Just like the movie's title, Plotz can't resist a couple of puns on Glass's name: "Hayden Christensen plays the opaque, empty Glass" (clever, David). Overall, he expresses reservations about the movie. Perhaps his view is skewed by the fact that he was watching a fictionalized version of a not-very-long-ago event that was indirectly related to him (and directly related to his wife; she was also a consultant for the movie). He says he thinks the movie is good but doesn't know.

He also doesn't seem to be that impressed with Hayden's performance: he says that "Steve" was a "lovely, winning, hilarious, and endearing person," and while Hayden has all the Glass tics, Glass made them endearing, and Hayden just makes them creepy. (If so, I'd chalk it up to the structure of the film, which doesn't show Glass interacting with anybody but his colleagues -- not counting the imaginary class of journalism students he orates in front of -- and interacting with his colleagues only in the context of the magazine; it doesn't show him hanging out with them after hours, doing any of the warm, friendly things Plotz remembers him doing. Glass in the movie appears to have no life whatsoever outside the magazine, which can't help but make him come across as somewhat creepy.) But Plotz is honest enough to admit that maybe Glass really was creepy, and Plotz, et al were just too stupid to notice -- and furthermore, he admits he prefers his "memory bank Steve," if only so he doesn't feel like such a dupe.

 

I saw that review, too, Shelly. It must be very hard to see a film like this made about incidents in your own life, but it's important to realize that this is a film - an artistic interpretation of the events - and not a documentary.

In spite of the fact that Chuck Lane did finally agree to work with Ray on the film, and therefore Peter had access to the original of his character, the real Chuck Lane and the one Peter portrayed on film couldn't be more different. Chuck has a kind of wide-eyed openness that couldn't be more different than the closed, snake-eyed character that Peter Sarsgard gave us in the film. And yet I thought it worked wonderfully.

The same goes for the Stephen Glass character. In that case, Hayden didn't have any access at all to the original person. So his portrayal is an interpretation, and I think it worked as well as Sarsgard's interpretation of Chuck's character did, particularly since the script didn't give much insight into Stephen's motivations.

All in all, I thought it was a great effort all around, and I'm really looking forward to Billy Ray's next project.

 

I'd also read that review; you can't expect someone who had been won over by this guy to be objective. I thought the movie showed he did charm his co-workers and to be honest, if I had no clue who Stephen Glass was and what he'd done beforehand, I probably would have been "charmed" the same way while watching the movie. Particularly since it was played by Hayden. It starts out with this Frank Capra-esque tidy view of journalism, with Glass as a lovable geek. Notice one of the girls in the class gives him this admiring look? It reminded me of the girl in Raiders of the Lost Ark who kept blinking her eyes at Prof. Jones so he could see she wrote "Love You" on her eyelids. Even knowing in advance what Glass did, it took me a while to see his j-school chat was yet another fantasy in his twisted mind.

BTW, having done the journalism thing for a while, I can tell you most journalists live, eat, breathe, and sleep their jobs and pretty much only hang out with each other.

Glass's self-serving attitude is very much like another disgraced "journalist" Jayson Blair. I saw this guy on t.v. and I thought, "What a creep. He's only sorry he got caught."

--MissPadme

 

Great post, Qui-Dawn. I totally agree. One quibble, however. Why the hell do you use " * " around every-other word? It's incredibly annoying, and makes your posts difficult to read. Beyond that, good show.

 

Just to clarify - it's not around "every other word" there, sweetie. And it's for the sake of emphasis....a very important thing to be keeping in mind when, as I do well suspect, most people would rather be preferring quite strongly to use *the* most vivid and sailor-blue language imaginable to describe Stephen Glass....asterisks and exclamation points, indeed!

I do find it rather fascinating, though, to understand that someone like Chuck Lane - who, by all rights, is absolutely entitled to loathe, revile, and scorn Stephen the most - still doesn't go out of his way to express that kind of venom....perhaps he feels that Stephen simply isn't worth it, which is understandable....and I can't help but agree in that sense. Like Stephen Glass is worth *anything* but only the utmost contempt and disdain.... Of course, it's quite clear - from remarks he makes in the 60 Minutes piece, and in the commentary as well - that he really did trust Stephen so implicitly....really took to him, viewed him as a trusted co-worker and friend, and honestly, genuinely *liked* him. Witness the point in the commentary when, as they're viewing the scene where Stephen comes to visit Chuck after the office takeover, and is making nice and in general acting like the perfect confidante friend....and Chuck confirms this on the commentary.

He points it out there, to affirm, how Stephen was the first one to make the friendly overtures and to offer assistance, if needed....and Chuck, of course, at that time feeling entirely alone and shunned by all the other TNR staff, who were clearly viewing him as the enemy within and *really* didn't trust him one bit....well, when offered that tiny bit of friendship and civility, that apparent understanding and decency from Stephen - Chuck was desperate for it. As anyone would be, too, in that kind of frigid atmosphere.... He took the proferred sympathetic, caring hand that seemed offered to him - and Stephen repaid that trust and goodwill with the worst, most venal betrayal that I can think of. He not only destroyed the trust and friendship that he once had with the TNR folks as co-workers....but he betrayed them on a *personal* level, as friends....as almost family, in their way. And that's only even more dreadful and heinous, and wholly unforgiveable too, as I see it.

You know, the whole thing really does put me in mind of a quote from "Friends".... The whole mess and foufarah very much leads me to think that, in his next life....Stephen Glass is coming back as a toilet brush.

Oh, as an aside....has anyone else, out of curiosity, checked out some of the articles originally published in 1998, right at the time that Forbes Digital first published their expose and the whole sordid mess subsequently blew up, full-view....? It's also some great stuff to delve into....definitely gives yet more of that "you were there" sense....lends it all an even greater sense of immediacy and relevancy, certainly. Of course....in today's world especially, it already had *that*....


Dawn.

 

"Just to clarify - it's not around "every other word" there, sweetie."

You're right. I was exaggerating a tad...but I think you do it enough where it seems like it's "every-other-word".


"And it's for the sake of emphasis....a very important thing to be keeping in mind when, as I do well suspect, most people would rather be preferring quite strongly to use *the* most vivid and sailor-blue language imaginable to describe Stephen Glass....asterisks and exclamation points, indeed!"

I see what you're saying...but I still find it kind of annoying and unnecessary...but that's just me. Move along, move along.


Anyways, another great post. I agree.

 

Let me see again if I can get these questions answered:

Was Glass supposed to have been having a romantic relationship with Chloë Sevigny's character?

The last shot of Hayden, finishing a smile or beginning to smile?

 

I'd also read that review; you can't expect someone who had been won over by this guy to be objective. I thought the movie showed he did charm his co-workers and to be honest, if I had no clue who Stephen Glass was and what he'd done beforehand, I probably would have been "charmed" the same way while watching the movie. Particularly since it was played by Hayden.

It starts out with this Frank Capra-esque tidy view of journalism, with Glass as a lovable geek. Notice one of the girls in the class gives him this admiring look? It reminded me of the girl in Raiders of the Lost Ark who kept blinking her eyes at Prof. Jones so he could see she wrote "Love You" on her eyelids.

Hehe! That's exactly what I was thinking when I watched that scene.

Even knowing in advance what Glass did, it took me a while to see his j-school chat was yet another fantasy in his twisted mind.

Me too. Until the very end, I thought the interview was something that took place before the you-know-what hit the fan, that it was something the filmmakers were using to convey irony. Instead, it turns out to be, as you said, a fantasy in Glass's twisted mind.

BTW, having done the journalism thing for a while, I can tell you most journalists live, eat, breathe, and sleep their jobs and pretty much only hang out with each other.

Ah, OK. I didn't know that.

Glass's self-serving attitude is very much like another disgraced "journalist" Jayson Blair. I saw this guy on t.v. and I thought, "What a creep. He's only sorry he got caught."

I haven't seen Blair on TV, but I don't find it hard to believe at all that he, like Glass, is only sorry he got caught.

Qui-Dawn...well said about Chuck Lane. I think you're exactly right about why he isn't venemous toward Glass, even though he's certainly got all the right in the world to be.

 

Shelly - I did actually see an interview done with Jayson Blair....might've been the one he did with Katie Couric, where in an admittedly restrained way (and more's the pity, I think, given what he did) she really let him have it on a number of occasions....really pinned him down very unforgivingly and relentlessly, too. And the clear impression that you're left with from watching him, seeing and hearing his attitude, his "pity parade" and sob stories of excuses - is that he doesn't have a shred of real remorse either, not *one* blasted whit. Again, what it comes down to is that, on the surface, it may almost seem like he's apologizing, genuinely contrite and regretful....someone not quite paying attention might even be suckered by it....but he's not actually, really *apologizing*, though, that's the thing. As with Stephen Glass....his attitude is clearly deceitful, treacherous, manipulative and pitying....he's proud of what he got away with, and sorry only that he got caught....despite his other claims.

What these two con men accomplish, in essence, is that they are acting the pseudo-apology without a shred of reality or weight behind it. They appear to be going through all the motions of contriteness and regret, but it takes only one good, solid, real look at them, and but a few seconds of listening to the smarmy sympathy ploys, lies and half-truths that these weasels keep coming out with - and the truth of the matter is only too infuriatingly loud and clear. They don't care about the ramifications of their acts, or who they hurt in the process....if they *did* have an ounce of conscience or compassion, they'd never have done it....plain and simple. Is there some sort of serious pathological problem there, a real psychological deficit apparent in both Stephen and Jayson? Yes, absolutely. Are they both seeking fame and pity, hoping to cash in on the "poor me, but I've atoned" angle? Again, yes.

Will they be forever branded now as total, treacherous liars who will go down in flames and infamy, and who by all rights will hopefully be forever ruined when karma *really* bites them in the rear?

Absolutely, positively, one-hundred-and-ten-percent *yes*. And I can't think of two "people" more deserving to be smacked totally senseless than these guys....I'd say more on that score, but might only end up having to censor myself. Eeep.


Dawn. (trust me....if you've seen the 60 Minutes interview with Stephen, you've seen essentially the same kind of attempted manipulation, "woe is me" attitude, callow arrogance and pity ploys used by Jayson Blair....birds of a feather, indeed....)

 

Obi-Wan2001 I'll take a shot at answering your two questions...

Was Glass supposed to have been having a romantic relationship with Chloë Sevigny's character?

I don't think so, no. I've read that Cloe's character in the film was a composite of two or more real people SG was friends with at the magazine. I think that relationship in the film was meant to show how close a lot of people were with him, taking him under their wing in many cases; and how betrayed their friendship was when they learned just how decietful and manipulative he had been.

The last shot of Hayden, finishing a smile or beginning to smile?

You mean this one?

[image=http://img4.photobucket.com/albums/v29/thegeo3/aSGcrop02.jpg]

I didn't get the feeling that he was smiling about anything. He knew he'd been well and truly caught.

 

The last shot of Hayden, finishing a smile or beginning to smile?


I think this one is up to interpretation. I see it as the beginning of a smirk. But that's what makes that shot (and Hayden's face) so good, you can't really tell... you can make your own conclusion. Fits into the movie perfectly.

 

Such a good performance from Hayden. He's definitely going to be around for a long, long time.

 

Hayden's character and Chloe's character were not meant to be having any kind of romantic relationship. At the beginning, the secretary mentions something about a "girlfriend," but other than that, it's never brought up. Plus, in the film Stephen Glass laments to another female co-worker that everyone assumes he's gay. I think it was more of a "maternal" type relationship with Chloe's character, to show how Mr. Glass hid behind the skirts of his female co-workers and drummed up their sympathies. They found him charming and adorable.

(I found him to be fingernails on the chalkboard annoying. I loathe ass-kissers).

As for that final expression--what can you say about Hayden except that he can say so much from a look (even if what he's trying to say isn't actually clear). I think it was just the slightest little smirk, but who knows the motivation behind it? It did make the character seem all the more creepy to me, which was a little touch of genius.

 

I think it was more of a "maternal" type relationship with Chloe's character, to show how Mr. Glass hid behind the skirts of his female co-workers and drummed up their sympathies.

He knew exactly what he was doing. He knew how to get on people's good sides: with Chuck Lane, it was being there for him when he just started the job and was feeling out of place; with the women, he drummed up their sympathy, roused up their protectiveness. Then when he was caught he immediately called Caitlin and cried on her shoulder, so that she was ready to take Chuck's head off: "What did you do to Steve?!"

As for that final expression--what can you say about Hayden except that he can say so much from a look (even if what he's trying to say isn't actually clear). I think it was just the slightest little smirk, but who knows the motivation behind it? It did make the character seem all the more creepy to me, which was a little touch of genius.

Definitely. I thought he was smirking too; I took it as him feeling perverse pride at how many stories he was able to fabricate before getting caught. If I ever got to talk to Hayden, I'd ask him about that: whose idea was it, and what it was meant to convey.

 

I love my life. I mean I really love my life. Ahhhhhhhh. No way to get my hands on the Shattered Glass DVD so my university brings Shattered Glass to me! It is playing all week long on channel 15 at Radford University and I plan on recording it and watching it a million times until I get my hands on the DVD. Man my day was just ******* made.

 

So...Captain_Typho...tell us what you thought!

 

Well I saw it once in theaters and I thought it was awesome. The acting all around is top notch and I'm not just referring to Christensen. Sarsgaard, Azaria, Dawson, Sevigny, and the rest of the cast all did an awesome job and it should have gotten some oscar nominations. It was a million times better than that piece of crap they call Lost in Translation. I am a media studies major here at college so the movie has even greater importance for me and others I am in the program with. Christensen though is great. His versatility as an actor is amazing. He adds a great accent to his natural voice in this film, making his performance very unique. The last scenes of the movie are so powerful, you want to cry for Glass for what he's going through. Hayden makes it so emotional and personal between Glass and Chuck Lane.

 

Glad to see this thread is still going!
As I see this movie again on DVD, I love to see what great versatility Hayden has as an actor.