Network (1976)

Diagnosis: Transference
Watch this film if you would like to transfer your frustrations into the storyline.
Film is particularly recommended for patients suffering from media distrust, paranoia, or otherwise negative affectations. This film is particularly recommended for patients hoping to make careers in any of the media arts, including (but not confined to): journalist, reporter, anchorman, writer, actor, publicist, or preacher.

Prognosis: * * * *
This film is completely worth watching, but ought to be considered and paid attention to. Not recommended as a film to run in the background while talking with others.
A terribly interesting subject for analysis. Analysis of this film ought to be behavioral in nature. Such an approach will allow patients to identify any target behaviors needing alteration, as well as modify those behaviors.

Synopsis
"This is not a psychotic episode. It is a cleansing moment of clarity."

Or so says Howard Beale (Peter Finch), the network news man who is relieved of duty within the first five minutes of the film. In his drunken reflection of his television career, Beale decides to kill himself and announces these intentions during his evening news broadcast. This last act of a desperate man sets Paddy Chayefsky's masterpiece Network in motion.

Beale's outburst brings him his first burst of high ratings in years, which may contribute to his ultimate decision that he is "a latter day prophett" who has been selected by the powers that be to bring the truth to the people of the world. And why is Beale selected for this honor? "Because you're on television, dummy" says the Voice who speaks to Beale in the night. As Beale becomes increasingly convinced of his own prophetic abilities, the network executives are divided. The old dogs of classical age of television journalism, independent of their network and unencumbered by a need to be ultimately profitable, is chiefly represented by Max Schumacher (William Holden). Schumacher's desire to protect Beale's reputation as a newsman gets him fired, leaving him available to begin an affair with the woman who replaces him as the producer of the evening news, Diana Christensen (Faye Dunaway).

Christensen embodies the new generation of network executives, dedicated to creating ratings and profits for their network and its parent corporation. Even as she and Schumacher make love, Christensen gives sultry updates on HUT point shares, rating hikes, and getting steals on old James Bond film syndication. The more prophetic Beale becomes, the happier Christensen becomes with the ratings. To replace the current evening line up of drama shows featuring "crusty but benign" older men, Christensen begins working on a Fall lineup including a show centered entirely around the activities of a terrorist group.

Paddy Chayefsky's screenplay is one that is as good to read as it is to watch enacted on the silver screen. What makes this film such a classic is that it is a self-fulfilling prophecy; the movie about Howard Beale has become Howard Beale. When Network first came out, it was classified as a satire of network television. But today, it seems old hat. Viewers without appreciation for the era in which a film was written will be bored and disappointed with Network. But better educated viewers will be blown away by Chayefsky's ability to predict the corporatization of television, as well as the popularity of reality television.