100 All-Time Films (To see the entire list, click here)
Sidney Lumet’s Network (1976)
The greatest film about television ever made and also one of the top scripts that ever came out of Hollywood. I feel that Network is a semi-forgotton film from the 70’s. I guess its pretty easy to get lost with some of the behemoth films of that decade. The truth of the matter is that Network may be as good as any of them.
A fictional TV network has poor ratings. An old has-been anchorman named Howard Beale starts speaking his mind on air (“I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”). Ratings soar and the Howard Beale show garners national acclaim as he brings the real truth to the American people. Beale uses his power to start revealing revelations about the television network he works for leaving the company executives with a serious problem.
This film has aged as well as almost any film in history considering how topical it is today. The film was an honest satire in the 1970’s that somehow morphed to reality in the intervening 35 years. Much of television nowadays, especially news, has regressed to theatrics. Reality television in prime time and cable ‘news’ stations with talking heads that banter at eachother from opposite political spectrums are a couple examples of this.
Network walks a fine line of what is news and what entertains us. Nowadays it feels like that line is even more blurred. This is an absolutely fantastic film.
