Damned if the subject didn't get the better of Berstein. He didn't develop the comic potential of his idea; instead, almost as if by reflex, he has written one of those scripts about how the common man must become involved, must learn what he stands for.

An empty monument to the senility of American liberalism.

It recreates the awful noise of ignorance that can still be heard.

Woody's terrific in the film, adding a comic sheen to an otherwise serious examination of the horrors of the Hollywood blacklist in the 1950s.