FemaleFirst.co.uk: DVD: Network [DVD] [1976]

Network [DVD] [1976]
enlarge	Director: Sidney Lumet Actors: Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch, Robert Duvall, Wesley Addy Studio: MGM Entertainment Category: DVD List Price: ~~£15.99~~ Buy New: £2.63 as of 23/11/2009 00:23 GMT details You Save: £13.36 (84%) New (5) from £2.63 Seller: twentyfiveorless Rating: 15 reviews Sales Rank: 4022 Format: PAL Languages: English (Original Language), German (Subtitles For The Hearing Impaired), English (Subtitles For The Hearing Impaired), French (Subtitled), Italian (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled) Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over Region: 2 Discs: 1 Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1 Number Of Discs: 1 Running Time: 117 Minutes Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2 Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.4 x 0.6 EAN: 5050070010008 ASIN: B000087I2F Theatrical Release Date: 1976 Release Date: March 17, 2003 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days


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Editorial Reviews: Amazon.co.uk Review Media madness reigns supreme in screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky's scathing satire about the uses and abuses of network television. But while Chayefsky's and director Sidney Lumet's take on television may seem quaint in the age of "reality TV" and Jerry Springer's talk-show fisticuffs, iNetwork/i is every bit as potent now as it was when the film was released in 1976. And because Chayefsky was one of the greatest of all dramatists, his Oscar-winning script about the ratings frenzy at the cost of cultural integrity is a showcase for powerhouse acting by Peter Finch, Faye Dunaway and Beatrice Straight (who each won Oscars), and Oscar nominee William Holden in one of his finest roles. Finch plays a veteran network anchorman who's been fired because of low ratings. His character's response is to announce he'll kill himself on live television two weeks hence. What follows, along with skyrocketing ratings, is the anchorman's descent into insanity, during which he fervently rages against the medium that made him a celebrity. Dunaway plays the frigid, ratings-obsessed producer who pursues success with cold-blooded zeal; Holden is the married executive who tries to thaw her out during his own seething midlife crisis. Through it all, Chayefsky (via Finch) urges the viewer to repeat the now-famous mantra "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take it anymore!" to reclaim our humanity from the medium that threatens to steal it away. I--Jeff Shannon/I

Customer Reviews: Showing reviews 1-5 of 15 1 2 3 Next » Top Quality Film November 12, 2003 L. Davidson (Belfast, N.Ireland) 23 out of 24 found this review helpful "Network" is quite simply one of the best films I have ever seen. It works on so many levels ;as a satire on the television industry and the people who work within it , as a philosophical critique of globalising late 20th Century consumer capitalism and the dehumanising , desensitising and deindividualising effect that television plays in that system (the hypnotist in the corner) . The acting and screenplay in "Network" is sensational; William Holden is superb as the world-weary and wise News Controller and his relationship with his boss Faye Dunaway works as a symbol of the uneasy symbiosis between the Old Absolute Moral Values that Holdens character represents and the amoral New "Humanoid" Values of the Television Generation that Dunaways' represents . Insane (or messianic) News Anchor Man Howard Beale (Peter Finch) is another brilliantly acted character , while Ned Beatty and Robert Duvall also give remarkable performances as a sinister media baron and a ruthless network executive respectively . There are so many memorable scenes - Finches "I'm mad as hell..." rant is a classic, his one to one meeting with Beatty in the Boardroom , Holden with his wife , Holden with Dunaway towards the end of the film... the list goes on. "Network" , like Howard Beale , touches on some very sensitive and profound issues ,ultimately about the nature of life and humanity itself and it does so in a stylish, intelligent way with some of the best acting you will ever see. "All I want from life is a 30 rating a 20 percentage." October 22, 2006 Sam Woodward (Swansea, UK) 10 out of 11 found this review helpful "I love it. Suicides, assassinations, mad bombers, mafia hit men, automobile smash-ups... 'The Death Hour'. Great Sunday-night show for the whole family." br / br /The back of the DVD's box describes 'Network' as "even more compelling relevant today than when it was first released, [it] is a wickedly funny, spot-on indictment of the TV news media." Very true - but I think there's also a lot more to it than that. br / br /The story revolves around Howard Beale, a news anchorman who is fired for his shows' poor ratings. As a result, he suffers a nervous breakdown announces during a live broadcast that he will kill himself live on air, during his very last show in 2 weeks time. But as a result of his announcement, his viewing figures soar ruthless TV executives aim to exploit him for all that he's worth set him up as an anti-establishment, everyman preacher. Never mind that his message condemns them, forget getting him psychiatric help, it's the viewing figures that count. br / br /This is a stark reminder of the central theme in the recent documentary 'The Corporation', which states that US big businesses can be compared with psychopaths due to their unwavering will to increase profits at any collateral cost irregardless of social impact or morality. As the Networks' CEO tells Beale, "there is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM ITT ATT DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide Exxon. Those are the nations of the world." Made in 1976 'Network' certainly comes across as a prophetic work when watched today - consider the increased power of corporations sensationalistic, 'black--white' coverage of warfare terrorism, not to mention US news shows which film car chases live. Real human lives turned into Hollywood movies packaged for entertaiment. br / br /The character of Howard Beale isn't actually in the film very much. A lot of the screen-time is given to one of his colleagues, played by William Holden - a menopausal everyman trying to make sense of the TV age, where everything everyone is product to be exploited to increase viewing figures. He has an affair with an up--coming executive who 'scripts' her own life those around them as if they were TV shows wants to create "a show based on the activities of a terrorist group. Joseph Stalin His Merry Band of Bolsheviks." Duvall says of her, " I'm not sure she's capable of any real feelings. She's TV generation. She learned life from Bugs Bunny." When Holden leaves his wife - representative of traditional American values - she tells him that "if you can't work up a winter passion for me, the least I require is respect allegiance," comdemning the new dehumanising values which this new age has ushered in. br / br /'Network' is a very thought-provoking piece. which has been very skilfully put together by Sidney Lumet, director of one of my all-time favourite films, 'Dog Day Afternoon'. While both films are well crafted leave their audiences with much to ponder, the pacing in both is a little slow at times. However, while watching one of the slower portions of 'Network', I began giving very serious consideration to throwing away my television - and I think I probably will. This is testament to the powerful way this film makes the audience question a lot of their assumptions implores them not to loose their basic humanity - which can surely only be a good thing. PROPHETIC! March 2, 2008 chiggs58th (Slough, England) 5 out of 5 found this review helpful I barely watch television anymore. Modern televisual entertainment is a sewer filled with floating solid waste called reality TV and weekly serials that are nothing than lame rehashes of old ideas padded out with endless commercials and station promos. NETWORK predicted all of this. This film made in 1976 was probably considered and intended to be an over the top parody of contemporary television. However, as fate would have it, after 33 years it has become a prophecy fulfilled. Watch it and see. I'm as Mad as Hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore! March 30, 2003 T. J. Turner (Manchester) 11 out of 13 found this review helpful Long out of fashion, despite an astonishing cast and huge success in its day, the release of 'Network' surely marks time for a reassessment. Yes, the tale of the shockwaves caused by a spurned newsreader having his nervous breakdown on air is over-the-top, ill-disciplined and occasionally hysterical. Written with an old man's distaste for the modern world (Paddy Chayefsky's script won an Oscar), it juggles a condemnation of seventies television, satire of Patty Hearst and hippy revolutionaries and a jaded look at big business.pThe DVD release is disappointing, especially when some of the principal participants are still around to provide commentaries, though perhaps 'Network' is not yet fashionable enough to provoke digging in the archives or the making of documentaries. But who cares? The Seventies were the pinnacle of serious movie-making in Hollywood and 'Network' deserves both comparison with 'Taxi Driver' and 'The Godfather', and space on your DVD shelf. Decades Ahead of its time April 25, 2008 Donaldo (Manchester, England) 3 out of 3 found this review helpful A few years ago, the writer Charlie Brooker became famous for his satirical, scathing `TVGOHOME' website, a fortnightly TV listing in the same style and font as the Radio Times. It was mostly concerned with the voyeuristic, nihilistic, gaping moral hole in the centre of the modern media. Charlie Brooker gave up doing the columns shortly after the turn of the millennium, because he said that though what he was writing had been satire, he began to realise that TV production companies were actually producing identical copies of his satirical programmes, most infamously in the case of `Touch the Truck'. br / br /Network is in many ways, Charlie Brooker about 30 years ahead of his time. As a consequence of a newsreader (Peter Finch) announcing that he is going to kill himself on air the next day, the network decide that rather than do the decent thing and have the newsreader hospitalised, that they should make use of this sensational asset to boost ratings. When network executive Faye Dunaway starts to get her way, she brings in a whole host of new programming to replace things like the news and designed purely to up ratings: a show for the news anchor to rant and rave all he wants; a weekly programme following violent revolutionaries commit actual robberies and raids ("The Mao-Tse Tung hour"); a homosexual soap opera; news predicted by fortune teller. br / br /In the short term, ratings go through the roof. But after a few weeks, they begin to drop off as people crave the new, the more sensational. Consider the development of Big Brother, starting from a vaguely experimental standpoint, to realising the sensationalist potential of putting thin-skinned people in deliberately volatile situations. No-one ever got killed in Big Brother, but when the recent racist behaviour erupted on-screen, few were mistaken in believing it to be anyone else except the producer's own fault. And yet hundreds of people would still turn up to watch the live evictions. Perhaps we get the TV we deserve. br / br /And it's the attitude of the viewers that the writer gets absolutely spot-on. When Peter Finch asks people to get "mad as hell", people go for it, when he lambasts on air the whole television industry night after nigh, they listen. But then they also tune into the Mao-Tse Tung hour without skipping a beat. The viewers, and therefore society at large is shown to be largely amoral - whatever holds out attention will do, never mind the ethics. Perhaps this is best demonstrated by William Holden's character, a veteran of news production. He leaves his wife to be with Faye Dunaway's executive, his wife representing the dull, self-sacrificing, honest and reliable nature of old TV, of old America. Faye Dunaway represents the rise of a different side of TV, imaginative, restless, irresponsible, rootless, energetic, thoughtless. The reluctance shows as William Holden is swept along with the current, powerless to resist. Much like the rest of us. br / br /It all seems so obvious to us now, the sensationalism, the amorality, the cheapness, the dumbing down, the deliberate aim for the lowest common denominator. What is surprising is that it was seen all those many years ago, so accurate and in such detail. br / Showing reviews 1-5 of 15 1 2 3 Next »

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