Network Literary Elements

Sidney Lumet

Faye Dunaway, Peter Finch, William Holden, Robert Duvall

Ned Beatty, Beatrice Straight

Drama

English

Won 4 Oscars; Writing written directly for the screen, Best Actor in a leading role, Best Actress in a leading role, Best Actress in a supporting role

November 27, 1976

Howard Gottfried

1976 New York City and Los Angeles behind the scenes of a last place television network, UBS as it attempts to regain ratings.

The narrator of this film is an unnamed male who reports on the life of Howard Beale, giving us the necessary facts of Beale's decline in ratings after the loss of his wife. There are several POVs in this film, that of Howard Beale the lead news anchor turned modern day prophet and Max Schumacher the Head of the News Division, as well as Diana Christensen a scripted-series Executive and Frank Hackett the Executive Senior Vice President of the network.

The tone is serious as it deals with the inner truth being revealed in a setting (television) where it primarily is not normally. Thus, creating a near satirical mood as it becomes heightened realism, with intense and passionate speeches given under bizarre circumstances which helps develop thematically the idea that the television is banal.

Protagonist is Howard Beale speaking for himself and the American people. The antagonist is Diana Christensen, Frank Hackett and Arthur Jensen representing corporate America.

The major conflict is between telling the truth or supporting the lies perpetrated on the American people through network television.

The film hits its climax at the very end, when Howard Beale reveals that UBS is being purchased by a conglomerate of banks representing wealthy Arabs. Once he reveals this to the American public, Frank Hackett and Diana Christensen have him murdered on live tv.

Chayefsky calls Howard Beale a "modern day prophet." And, throughout history prophets have been beaten and/or killed for stating their beliefs.

The Great Ahmed Kahn is introduced to a group of entertainment lawyers, and once negotiations begin to get heated, he fires a pistol to regain control. Kahn is one of two men who murder Beale. Kahn is himself a loaded gun, and as Chekhov says, "One must never place a loaded rifle on stage if it isn't going to go off."

After being fired, Howard Beale announces on live tv that he is going to blow his brains out next week on the show. The scene is revealed in the control booth and only two people hear what he says, and only one person speaks up and tells everyone. All others are chatting with each other, unaware of Beale's declaration. In the scene we only see Beale on a tiny screen. Understating this announcement gives it a greater weight.

Lumet would use Themes from the film to inform what he would do with the camera while shooting. In Network, he used the idea of corruption. In the opening scene between Max and Howard, he uses natural light only, his form of uncorrupted. And in one of the final scenes where the executives plot to murder Beale he wanted to shoot it like a Ford commercial, thus, in his words corrupting the camera.

Lumet shoots Arthur Jensen with heavy back light, alluding that he is God to Howard Beale.

Diana Christensen and Frank Hackett are seeking to raise ratings and become a network that competes, and to do that they place a man who, for all intents and purposes, is having a mental and emotional breakdown.

Lumet opens and closes the film with the same shot of four monitors. The first shot shows four news anchors, representing the four major television networks competing for ratings, and that they are newsmen helps us to know that they are serious networks. The last shot shows Howard Beale's murder and the other three screens play commercials, thus showing what networks will air in order to get ratings.