Network (Sidney Lumet, 1976)

By law, any synopsis or review of Network must include one or all of the following phrases: "prescient," "crystal ball," "prophecy." I'm sorry, but predicting that TV would grow increasingly more sensationalistic, corporate-driven and vacuous doesn't exactly count as master soothsaying. That doesn't mean it's not a message worth conveying -- it's the method of conveyance that matters. For example, 1995's The Net accurately predicted the problem of identity theft over the interwebs, but no one seems to be hailing its visionary qualities or lamenting why we didn't heed the clarion call of Sandra Bullock and Dennis Miller. That's because the message was conveyed to the audience mostly through car chases.

On the other end of the spectrum, we have Network, which conveys its message primarily through  endless preaching and speechifying. I wanted to like this movie, really -- it's one of many classics I'm embarrassed not to have seen, and I'm not averse to satires of TV (I absolutely love The Truman Show). Also, I have no problem with dialogue that's considered "unrealistic" -- hell, I even defended (parts of) Juno. But my God, screenwriter Paddy Chayevsky is in love with his typewriter. Here's an excerpt of a monologue by Beatrice Straight, which basically won her the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, even though this was essentially her only scene: 

This is your great winter romance, isn't it? Your last roar of passion before you settle into your emeritus years. Is that what's left for me? Is that my share? She gets the winter passion, and I get the dotage? What am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to sit at home knitting and purling while you slink back like some penitent drunk?

The question isn't whether or not characters actually talk like that -- the question is, simply, do you want to listen to characters talk like that? I don't. But, I do want to hear characters talk like Walter and Phyllis in Double Indemnity, even though their patter is equally far-fetched.

Also, several of the characters are nothing but symbols. Diana Christensen (Faye Dunaway), for example, is television incarnate. How I can say this with such certainty? Because another character CALLS HER THOSE EXACT WORDS. Actually, I don't have a problem with characters being symbols, but the audience figured this out about Diana in her first scene. The whole relationship between Max (William Holden) and Diana, in fact, is just an excuse for Chayevsky to set up new-school TV seducing old-school TV and then letting old-school tell off new-school at the end. Blah.

The stuff that I liked was the Howard Beale subplot and the whole "I'm mad as hell" bit. The rambling monologues actually fit Beale's character since he was spiraling into insanity. Unfortunately, the other characters didn't have this excuse.