“I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it any more.” If you can find a movie from the 70’s more prescient about the world today I’d like to see it. I couldn’t sleep, so I turned on the TV which happened to be on Turner Classic Movies. I watched the end of “3 days of the Condor” because Sydney Pollack had just died and it is a great movie. More prescience from the 70’s about how this country keeps its 300 million oil addicts happy. Then came “Network”. I had seen it before but it was a good 10 years ago. Also read Sydney Lumet’s book maybe 8 years ago. I remember him saying that he missed his friend Paddy Cheyefsky, who wrote “Network”. We all miss him. If there is a heaven I envison Paddy and Rod Serling talking over diner food and unfiltered cigarettes. It was 1976. Watergate was now a term. Viet Nam was over. The revolutions had dissapated and the 80’s me generation was lurking in the pre-dawn haze. The only things left were disco and bullshit. Watching revolutionaries bring agents and lawyers to argue deal points for a TV show is funny and painful. Painful because every ridiculous thing in this movie from the 1970’s has come true. Peter Finch and his tirades are poetic and sadly accurate. He talks about how dangerous it is to have multi-national conglomerates owning tv networks. Well, here we are 30 years later and 5 giant corporations own every major media outlet. Scary. Aside from the affair between William Holden and Faye Dunaway (standard 70’s sexual politics stuff) this film is great. Although Holden gives a great speech about how death is real and has “definable features” in his twilight years. I still think the film didn’t need the relationship. Give me more Robert Duvall and his executive power trips. Only to feel the pain of corporate “restructuring”. Cheyefsky letting us all know that we are expendable. Dunaway doing anything to succeed, while missing the global picture. Holden wanting out of the whole mess and Finch going nuts. Ned Beatty talking about the world economy in a huge board room is crazy and fluid. The kind of fluidity that destroys your backyard in a flash flood but ultimately had to happen. And your yard is better for it. Even though the horror of watching your beautiful gas grill get washed away like pool full of childhood tears still haunts you. It’s ok, you needed to eat more healthy. This film is funny and then horribly true. Like when you see a guy in his 50’s in a Ferrari jacket and hair plugs trying to pick up girls in their 20’s. It’s ridiculous and funny until you realize that could be you in a heartbeat. Then you want to cry. Cry as you look online for cheap hair surgery and “All Natural” boner pills. “How could this happen?” You ask. The guy in the Ferrari jacket tried to warn you but you just laughed. Now who’s laughing? “Network.” Put it in your Netflix cue. Look for it on cable. Watch it and learn. Learn what great screenwriting, directing and acting can do when put together. PALM STRIKE!
Graham Elwood
