Breslin and Hamill: Deadline Artists

Jimmy Breslin and Pete Hamill; 2 of the most influential reporters of the 20th Century were similar to each other in many different ways, couldn't be more different from each other. They were celebrities, usually in the right way, but sometimes, the distraction as much as the messenger. This documentary is historical evidence of where journalism was, and where it naturally headed, and how we might rue the day we handed the reigns of the press to cyberspace.

This was disappointing and really not so much about writing or Pete Hamill. It's about Breslin as a celebrity and liberal icon.

Greetings again from the darkness. From the department of 'The more things change, the more they stay the same' (a phrase attributed to French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr), there is a segment in this documentary showing Nixon's Vice President Spiro Agnew comments on the "evil liberal media". The only thing missing is the now all-too-familiar catchphrase "fake news". If, as many believe, we are in a re-run of a political cycle from that era, we should be so fortunate to have the writers and journalists of that era ... specifically Jimmy Breslin and Pete Hamill.

Co-directors Jonathan Alter (political journalist and author), John Block, and Steve McCarthy are behind this HBO documentary that flashes back to a time when reading the morning newspaper was a ritual for much of the world. This was before the internet and certainly before Tweeters began presenting opinions as breaking news. At one point, the city of New York supported 7 different newspapers, and these two writers - very different in style - are forever linked to the city, to their 'street poetry' and to each other.

Jimmy Breslin and Pete Hamill were at various times co-workers and rivals, yet always friends ... a friendship based on mutual professional respect. Pete was the more likable one, while Jimmy was the brash New Yorker - a celebrity who admittedly had enemies. The filmmakers provide a background on each, often with the writers themselves providing color commentary. Specific events from certain years are used a story structure: 1984 and Bernhard Goetz, 1989 shows our current President (30 years younger) dishing racial divisiveness via an emotional reaction, the 1963 JFK assassination and how Breslin chose to interview the man digging the grave, Vietnam in 1966, 1976 when both were employed by The New York Daily News, the letter Breslin received from Son of Sam in 1977, the same year Hamill was editor of two newspapers simultaneously, the 1985 AIDS outbreak, and the 1991 Crown Heights riots.

We learn Breslin often held court at a local bar, and that Hamill dated Jackie Onassis. Breslin's baseball book "Can't Anybody Play this Game?" is discussed, as is what Hamill calls "the rhythm of writing". A 2015 interview with the two elderly men makes the bond quite obvious, and an emotional segment shows Pete and his wife recalling that tragic day on 9/11. The talking head interviews featured are many and impressive, including: the siblings, offspring and spouses of the two men; writers Tom Wolfe, Gay Talese, and Nicholas Pileggi ("Goodfellas"); performers Tony Bennett, Robert Deniro, and Shirley Maclaine (also a love interest); activist Gloria Steinem; cartoonist Gary Trudeau; and other historians, journalists, and writers.

Anne Marie is mentioned as the woman who sat between the two writers at the Daily News, and we can't help but think she deserves her own movie, given her connections (so to speak). Breslin and Hamill derived energy and were driven by passion for their causes and observations ... and their agenda was drawn from the need to get the truth told, not just the glory of a headline. The message is that local journalism is important, while today, we are allowing it fade away. Breslin is shown hunting and pecking until the end (in 2017), and it's likely Pete will as well.

As bombastic & fascinating as its subjects; not afraid to expose the darker sides of these heroes who are merely human; a reminder of how important it is to be one who seeks - and fights for - the truth.

I worked in New York television, just outside the professional circle loosely defined by Jimmy Breslin, Pete Hamill and the City's great newspapers and journalists of the 1980s. I did move through the worlds they each covered and read their columns. Like most New Yorkers, I appreciated their service to humankind. "Breslin and Hamill: Deadline Artists" is a top shelf production that weaves archival images, TV appearances and recent interviews and some of Jimmy's and Pete's best copy. The film's pulse and temperature matches its two different journalists, their respective sets of colleagues, and the poetry of their reporting and living style. We hear from Breslin's living sons; his surviving second wife and from Hamill's wife, co-workers and media pundits. Much of this is emotionally moving and fact-based and worth a watch - two or three times.