Sometimes we watch a film or catch a song on the radio while crawling tortoise-like in bumper to bumper traffic and relate it to our personal experience.

It happened to me the other day in a cinema full of British expats, eagerly waiting to take in the Hollywood movie The Post where Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep lock horns over whether a newspaper should rattle swords with the strongest government on earth.

There’s not the slightest doubt that what Steven Spielberg, the film director, said is true. “It’s no nostalgia,” he told The Guardian (January 19). It’s exciting how a 1960s scenario can be juxtaposed within today’s context.

In The Financial Times of January 17, Nigel Andrews describes the film as an “old rain dance done with an occasional new glitter”. To be the devil’s advocate, to some extent, what Andrews said isa close interpretation of the Holly-wood blockbuster.

This points to the need for a ‘change’ in what type of news the media gather and broadcast. Such change implies the fundamental need for credible and professional journalists as a paramount requisite in democracies.

This concern relates also to the scenario on this little rock we call home. With the country still struggling to find its feet in the aftermath of Daphne Caruana Galizia’s assassination, it is critical that journalists play their roles in translating the news behind the news to the public.

As readers and listeners, we’d be wasting time if we remain delusional and pretend that the media landscape – both locally and internationally – will fix itself or will prime its arsenal to silence those who oppose our views and opinions.

As readers, we tend, at times, to be extremely vague and unpredictable, but it’s us, the citizens, who make the news relevant and robust.

The world is never the way it is as most media outlets want us to believe

Through the magic wand that is the internet, the journalists’ rule of ‘proximity’ has been shattered because now we can be anywhere, anytime. Reporters must grasp the new tools and exploit them to inform in more innovative ways while sticking religiously to the maxim ‘stick to facts’.

As media consumers, it won’t hurt us to nurture a culture of ‘fact-checking’ especially on news items that impact our lives. Readers cannot be just swallow news items and stop there or rebel if the news goes against their world view of things.

As readers, we need to be on the prowl for more credible and professional journalistic work in order to be informed of the facts in the best possible manner.

It’s smart to remember that Walter Cronkite’s famous parting shot “And that’s the way it is” after delivering the news did not stand the test of time. Neither was it correct when he first coined that seemingly innocuous phrase. The world is never the way it is as most media outlets want us to believe.

From a Maltese perspective, we cannot deny the fact that trends emerging in the US and in Europe won’t make it to these shores. Since globalisation took over media landscapes, US problems somehow become struggles the people have to deal with. One has to bear in mind the volatile media scenario and gargantuan struggle reporters face on a daily basis.

I believe that Maltese newsrooms have what it takes to become more innovative and robust enough to enhance their reporting.

Reality is not Hollywood with its make believe and razzmatazz, but such adaptations as The Post can push us to think out of the box.

It’s essential to be media literate. Those who gobble what their leaders blurt out, flashes a wake-up call for more media literacy, something society lacks on an alarming scale.

The more media savvy and well-informed readers are, the more reporters will have to sharpen their teeth and plant them into the meat that matters.

Josef Cutajar is a final-year student reading for an Honours degree in Media and Communications at the University of Malta.