Shattered Glass

Writer and director Billy Ray (adapting an article by Buzz Bissinger) tells of the downfall of disgraced New Republic writer Stephen Glass, who skyrocketed to temporary fame with fraudulent articles, often wholly fictitious. Hayden Christensen plays Glass with puppy-dog ardor, alternately schmoozing and sandbagging. Brandishing fake modesty like a cattle prod, he makes Glass a combination of star quarterback and team mascot. As Glass goes from hero to villain in his own story, the good-guy role devolves onto editor Charles Lane (Peter Sarsgaard, marvelous in the sort of subtle performance that seldom wins awards but that other actors notice and learn from). Ray’s movie gives us what we seldom get in real life: the huge satisfaction of seeing a smarmy, brown-nosing little fake get what’s coming to him.