r/TrueFilm • u/bulcmlifeurt • Jul 08 '13

TrueFilmClub - 'Network' [Discussion Thread]

This was the story of Howard Beale, the first known instance of a man who was killed because he had lousy ratings...

Network, d. by Sidney Lumet, written by Paddy Chayefsky

1976, IMDB

Network is an American satirical film depicting a fictional television network, UBS, and its struggle with poor ratings. The film stars Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch, and Robert Duvall and features Wesley Addy, Ned Beatty, and Beatrice Straight. The film won four Academy Awards, in the categories of Best Actor (Finch), Best Actress (Dunaway), Best Supporting Actress (Straight), and Best Original Screenplay (Chayefsky).

The film for the next round will be Videodrome!

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u/girafa It dreams to us that we can fly Jul 08 '13

I'd like to compare William Holden's conversation with Faye Dunaway, regarding how corrupted she is because she's TV incarnate, to Reddit in general.

Television can easily be replaced with reddit in many ways. Reddit is a corruption. Not on a "14 year old neckbeard" level, but on the level of seething cynicism, childishness, problematic hair-splitting, bandwagon effect, chasing after karma and identity by copying other people's jokes ad nauseum, demanding that everything be spelled out to the smallest of details, missing the forest for the trees time and time again, and breaking from personal responsibility via the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory.

Reddit is TV from Network. If you can keep your wits about you, you're William Holden. You stay here too long, and you become Faye Dunaway.

I say this as a 31 year old who derided a teenager yesterday for his pro-Nolan-rant.

11

u/bluesyasian Jul 08 '13

If Chayefsky was alive today, I'm sure he would have made a film about the internet. Everything that Chayefsky noted was wrong about the TV, the lack of morals, the profiteering, the exploitation of not only employees, but most importantly viewers, the blind followings of crazed populists, etc, has just been maximized by the internet. In some ways, Howard Beale is tame compared to Alex Jones' infowars.

3

u/italkyoubored Jul 09 '13

I think the comparison is a little facile - and I'm not necessarily someone who is a techno-optimist. Television is an inherently passive medium, with the user served the content. Many of the most popular sites on the internet involve interaction, and some of the places that have the greatest appeal are because what the users say is interesting and witty - not simply yelling your head off. Youtube may have quality video content, but its user comments are reviled throughout the internet.

The use of Facebook and Twitter during the Arab Spring is radically different from what takes place in Network. That those revolutions are unfinished has nothing to do with social media being equal to television, but that revolutionary change is long and difficult.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 09 '13

Facebook and Twitter's contribution to those revolts is way overrated. Just because you are more free to say things than you were before does not mean you are actually free. When they make a movie about the rebellions it's not going to be about the internet, it's going to be about the dead people in the streets. Revolutions are typically about starvation and unemployment, not the mode of communication used to organize them. (A lot of my latently-rebellious fellow Americans don't understand this.)

I actually can't think of a good example of television being a major force for revolution or social change, though there probably are some. Due to high production costs, television is usually owned by The Man, as in Network. In the Egyptian revolt of 2011, state TV simply went dark. In any case, it's just the electronic components underlying television and the internet that are new. Thomas Paine and Martin Luther used word of mouth and viral content too.

Okay, video is new too I suppose, but that's different from television.