Network

In 1974, television news reporter Christine Chubbuck in Sarasota, Florida, committed suicide live on the air. It was the first time such a thing had happened, and it left viewers tuned in to the live broadcast stunned. Depression and loneliness were the listed reasons behind her suicide, but there was also an unrequited love for a co-worker in that mix. This act was satirically referenced by screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky when he said, “Television will do anything for a rating… anything!”

Not long after her death, Paddy was spinning this idea into a script about just such a thing. The 1970s was a decade of tumult and distrust, and the idea that a news station would exploit mental illness for share points appealed to him. Whether he was directly influenced by Christine Chubbuck’s suicide is unclear, but it was most likely at least partially on his mind while penning the script; his personal notes make no mention of the incident at the time, which, if he was unaware of it, makes it one heck of a coincidence. Only he would know for sure, and since he passed away in 1981, we cannot ask him about it anymore. 

What he wrote about is a biting satire of the television industry, a dark view on how the media works, and is just insane enough that we could believe this would really happen, especially in the 1970s. Nowadays, while someone like our suicidal reporter, Howard Beale (Peter Finch), might still be given air time and exploited, there would also be targets like mental health caregivers, the pharmaceutical companies, and other such people or industries to point a finger at. It would be more fodder for satire, but it would also muddy up the waters. Chayefsky’s script is more straightforward than that, though it does go after multiple targets in its attempts to point the finger at the lack of humanity in the big business of television. 

The film opens up in the fall of 1975 when longtime anchor for the UBS (Union Broadcasting System) Evening News, Howard Beale, learns from his friend and news division president Max Schumacher (William Holden) that he has just two more weeks on the air because of declining ratings. The next evening, Beale announces on live television that on the following Tuesday’s broadcast he intends to kill himself live on TV. UBS wants him fired, but Max intervenes, offering Howard an opportunity to apologize on the air and accept a dignified farewell. Instead, Howard launches into a rant about life being a bunch of BS. This causes the ratings for the show to spike. Much to Max’s dismay, the network wants to exploit the situation. This soon spirals out of control when Howard gets his own show, allowing him to rant about anything on his mind like a crazed prophet of the airwaves. When these rants go against the financial interests of UBS, though, something has to be done about it. 

Meanwhile, Max has begun an extramarital affair with Diana Christensen (Faye Dunaway), the programming chief and driving force behind The Howard Beale Show. But things start turning sour when Howard’s rhetoric starts ruffling feathers at the network and its parent company. When Howard starts shifting his message towards mortality and other more dour topics, a shift brought upon by the insistence of Arthur Jensen, Communications Corporation of America (CCA) Chairman. Jensen knows that UBS is in desperate need of money and is planning a merger with a Saudi Arabian company, something Howard was preaching against on his show, and directs Howard to shift to a different topic. His new, less engaging, direction has caused ratings to tank, threatening to lose the all-important sponsors. This pressure causes a rift between Diana and Max that convinces him their relationship is short-lived at best. 

Everything you need to know about the themes of this film can be summed up in a single scene between Howard and Jensen. Jensen arranges a meeting with Howard, refusing to fire him because of the ratings boost but needing to redirect the ship. During this brief scene, he goes on a tirade about how Howard has “meddled with the primal forces of nature…” He then goes on a rant about the world, comparing it to “a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable bylaws of business. The world is a business…it has been since man crawled out of the slime…one vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men work to serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock.” This rant is just as insane as anything that Howard is preaching over the airwaves.

As insane as it is, though, there are plenty of people out there who see the world this way, looking at it as one vast business meant to exploit the poor and line the pockets of the rich. Money talks and BS walks. You’re also only as good as what you’ve done for the company lately, and as long as Howard is bringing in the sponsor money, he is tolerated. He goes from spouting nonsense and raving about being “Mad as hell” and urging those watching to shout the same thing from their windows to suddenly being given his own show where he takes to the air, televangelist style, to preach his rhetoric. 

Max plays the voice of reason in this whole situation, giving voice to his conscience against keeping his friend on the air under these circumstances. For his efforts, Frank Hackett (Robert Duvall), Diana’s boss, has him fired. Diana, seeking another hit, cuts a deal with a terrorist group called the Ecumenical Liberation Army (ELA) for a new series, The Mao Tse-Tung Hour, broadcasting footage of their activities as a docudrama. This relationship goes off the deep end quickly when Howard’s new direction starts bleeding into the ratings for The Mao Tse-Tung Hour and the ELA wants a new time slot or a better lead-in show. 

While this film has both feet firmly planted in the land of satire, it is not too far off from reality. That makes this film feel like a dark revelation of where the media was heading at the time the movie was released. The almighty dollar rules the world, and everyone in the television industry is looking for that next best thing, especially in our current landscape where there are so many options it takes something really special to get people to notice. Network is looking at that landscape with an air of sarcasm, but we can see examples like this in our real-world broadcasts even today.

This film showcases some truly gifted talent in front of the camera, many of whom got the notice from the Academy. Five actors were nominated for Oscars with three of them winning, an achievement only accomplished one time before and one since. Peter Finch is a particular standout in what would end up being his final film role. He passed away before the Oscars telecast and became the first acting recipient to receive one posthumously. It wouldn’t happen again until Heath Ledger won for The Dark Knight in 2009.

Sidney Lumet was once again overlooked for Best Director, losing out to John G. Avildsen for Rocky. In total, he was nominated four times as a director and once for a writer. He won none of these. It is considered one of the greatest examples of Oscar snubbing a director, and it wasn’t until 2004 when the Academy recognized him with an honorary Oscar for lifetime achievement. He has his Oscar, but the fact that he never won a competitive one is ridiculous. Network is a better-made film than Rocky, though I personally enjoy Rocky more because I am a romantic at heart. But Lumet should have won for 12 Angry Men or Dog Day Afternoon. 

Network is a pessimistic film by design. It takes shots at the media, consumerism, and how easily people are led by what they see on TV. We’re seeing a lot of that in our modern media, too, with news outlets catering to what people want to hear rather than what is really happening. Fox News was even fined hundreds of millions for deliberately misleading their viewers. The media has only gone further down this rabbit hole since 1976, and so watching a film like Network seems as prophetic as Howard Beale did to those in his studio audience. People’s tastes shift all the time, though, and what stirs people up one day bores them the next. When that starts to happen, something new must happen to get people excited all over again. We see that play out in the finale, a moment that should be shocking but feels like an inevitability. 

Academy Award Nominations:

Best Picture: Howard Gottfried

Best Director: Sidney Lumet

Best Actor: Peter Finch (won)

Best Actor: William Holden

Best Actress: Faye Dunaway (won)

Best Supporting Actor: Ned Beatty

Best Supporting Actress: Beatrice Straight (won)

Best Original Screenplay: Paddy Chayefsky (won)

Best Cinematography: Owen Roizman

Best Film Editing: Alan Heim

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Release Date: November 27, 1976

Running Time: 121 minutes

Rated R

Starring: Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch, and Robert Duvall

Directed by: Sidney Lumet