'Trumbo' resurrects Hollywood's darkest chapter

Dalton Trumbo, the famed Hollywood screenwriter, knew what it meant when he was officially summoned to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947.

"Trumbo," starring Bryan Cranston, resurrects the darkest chapter in Hollywood history — the blacklist — and celebrates one of the men the movie industry once tragically shunned.

"To watch it turn around, to watch him go from villain to hero, is fascinating," says Mitzi Trumbo, the 70-year-old daughter of the screenwriter.

During the decade-long blacklist, studios refused to hire any of the so-called Hollywood Ten — those who, like Trumbo, refused to cooperate with the HUAC, which was acting in the grip of Cold War paranoia.

[...] Trumbo," which opens Friday, is the first major release to tell the story through its actual people.

When he told screenwriter professor Ian McLellan Hunter that he liked his 1953 romantic comedy Roman Holiday, Hunter responded: I didn't write that movie.

The blacklist began to break when director Otto Preminger announced he would credit Trumbo for 1960's "Exodus."

Collectively, they view the lessons of the blacklist as hugely relevant — that the politics of fear and the circus of politically motivated congressional committees remain very much in use today.