the m0vie blog

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and this week with special guests Ciara Moloney and Dean Buckley, The 250 is a weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released Saturdays at 6pm GMT.

So this week, Sidney Lumet and Paddy Chayefsky’s Network.

Howard Beale is a veteran newscaster on a struggling network. When he is given his two weeks’ notice, Beale threatens to shoot himself live on the air as his final broadcast. The television journeyman becomes a media storm and ratings sensation, as the network eagerly seeks to capitalise on what could be a once-in-a-generation phenomenon.

At time of recording, it was ranked 219th on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

Show Notes:

• Recorded 2nd July 2022.
• Note: Due to the COVID-19 situation, this episode was recorded remotely. We suspect, going forward that a lot of our episodes will be until the crisis resolves.
• Note: Darren incorrectly implies that Shasta McNasty was overseen by Doug Herzog. While it was a 1999 show that generated a moral panic, it aired on UPN rather than Fox.
• Network at The Internet Movie Database.
• The IMDB 250 as it appeared at time of recording.
• Follow Ciara Moloney at Twitter.
• Read Ciara at The Sundae.
• Follow Dean Buckley at Twitter.
• Read Dean at The Sundae.
• Listen to Ciara and Dean on The Sundae Presents.
• Pauline Kael reviews Network at The New Yorker, December 1976.
• Paddy Chayefsky collects his Academy Award for Network, March 1977.
• Kevin Jacobsen at Gold Derby lists all the films to be nominated in the four acting categories, November 2017.
• Maureen Lee Lenker at Entertainment Weekly lists all the posthumous Academy Award winners, April 2021.
• Catherine Shoard at The Guardian reports on the restructuring of the 2021 Academy Awards ceremony based on a possible Chadwick Boseman win, May 2021.
• Beatrice Straight wins her Academy Award, March 1977.
• Keith Phipps at The Ringer looks back at Martin Scorsese’s complicated relationship with the Academy Awards, February 2020.
• Michael Musto at The Village Voice looks back on Piper Laurie’s reaction to losing the Academy Award to Beatrice Straight, October 2011.
• Rick Du Brow at The Los Angeles Times discusses how Network is “more real than ever”, September 1990.
• RTÉ covers George Clooney’s plans to stage Network as a live television play, October 2005.
• John Patterson at The Guardian explores the “flawed satire” of Network, November 2016.
• Kyle Smith at The National Review discusses “what Network got wrong”, May 2020.
• Graham Fuller at Vanity Fair looks back on how Network predicted the future of media, March 2022.
• Peter Bogdanovich at Observer discusses Doug Herzog’s disastrous tenure at Fox, October 1999.
• Rubert Murdoch voices his disappointment about Doug Herzog’s slate of programming to The Los Angeles Times, November 1999.
• Ben Brantley at The New York Times reviews the stage production of Network, November 2017.
• Tom Shales at The Washington Post reflects on the legacy of Paddy Chayefsky’s Marty, August 1981.
• Ronald Holloway at Variety reviews the cinematic adaptation of Marty, March 1955.
• Tim Teeman at The Daily Beast looks back over the life and career of Paddy Chayefsky, February 2014.
• Sidney Lumet talks to The New York Times about returning to television, January 2001.
• Wallace Turner at The New York Times reports on the arrest of Patty Hearst, Spetember 1975.
• John M. Crewsdon at The New York Times reports on the CIA’s opening of the mail intended for Senator Humphreys, September 1975.
• The Day in Quotes looks at the misquoting of Peter Finch’s misquote of the iconic line from Network, November 1979.
• Robert Wainwright talks to ABC about the remarkable life of George Finch, June 2015.
• Shane Maloney and Chris Grosz at The Monthly look back on Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh’s relationship to Peter Finch, June 2009.
• Owen Roizman talks to The American Cinematographer about shooting Network, December 2021.
• Stephen Colbert talks to The New York Times about his love of Network, May 2011.
• Bruce Handy at Vanity Fair talks about what Network got right and wrong about modern media, February 2014.
• Robert J. Cole at The New York Times reports on MGM’s purchase of United Artist, May 1981.
• Alison Durkee at Forbes looks at Amazon’s purchase of MGM, March 2022.
• David Itzkoff talks to Fast Company about researching Paddy Chayefsky and Network, May 2014.
• Ted Johnson at Deadline looks at the controversy involving Disney and the “don’t say gay” law, April 2022.
• Elahe Izadi at The Washington Post reports on Disney’s first “exclusively gay moment”, March 2017.
• Adam White at The Independent reports on the gay character featured in Jungle Cruise, July 2021.
• Charles Pulliam-Moore at Gizmodo reports on the criticism of capitalism in The Boys, August 2019.
• Andrew Sullivan at New York Magazine looks at how Donald Trump seized control of The Republican Party, July 2017.
• David Smith at The Guardian reports on Donald Trump’s tightening grip on the Republican Party, January 2022.
• Jacob Weisberg at Slate looks back on Ronald Reagan’s involvement with General Electric, January 2016.
• James Hohmann at The Washington Post looks back on Ned Beatty’s involvement with Network, June 2021.
• Joshua Bote at KQED reflects on Jerry Rubin’s conversion from counter-culture icon to capitalist, October 2017.
• R.C. Baker at The Village Voice considers Jerry Rubin’s journey from yippie to yuppie, September 2017.
• Jackson Arn at The New Statesman looks at how the baby boomers sold out, May 2019.
• Aaron Sorkin accepts his Academy Award for The Social Network, February 2011.
• Karim Zidan at The Guardian looks at Saudi Arabia’s history of sportswashing, March 2022.
• Alex Shephard at The New Republic considers the Saudi Golf League, June 2022.
• The National Post reports on the holding of WWE wrestlers “hostage” in Saudi Arabia over a live feed row, November 2019.
• Saul Austerlitz at The Dissolve considers cinema’s long and complicated relationship to television, April 2014.
• Parks and Recollection with Rob Lowe and Andrew Yang.
• Rob Lowe reviews Mad as Hell for The New York Times, February 2014.
• Saul Austerlitz considers the life and career of Paddy Chayefsky at The National, March 2014.
• Time reports on the reaction to Network inside the television industry, December 1976.
• Tom Shales at The Washington Post reports on Chrysler’s sponsorship of a television broadcast of Network, Ocotber 1978.
• Lily Rothman at Time looks back on how the “vast wasteland” speech radically altered the development of television as a medium, May 2016.
• Dan Lybarger at The Arkansas Democrat Gazette considers the suicide on air of Christine Chubback, March 2017.
• David Itzkoff at The New York Times considers the legacy and impact of Christine Chubback’s on-air suicide, August 2016.
• Raphael Helfand at The Fader reports on the musical career of would-be presidential assassin John Hinckley, April 2022.
• Kevin E.G. Perry at NME looks at Charles Manson’s attempts to launch a music career, August 2019.
• S. Flannagan at Grunge looks at how David Bowie was considered as a potential target by Mark Chapman, August 2021.
• Tony Cavin at NPR discusses the challenges in reporting on mass killings, May 2022.
• Kelly McBride and Amaris Castillo at NPR argue for refusing to name mass murderers, March 2021.
• Rachel McGrath at The Huffington Post reports on guests who felt exploited by The Jeremy Kyle Show, May 2019.
• Graeme McAulay writes at The Guardian about producing a documentary on The Jeremy Kyle Show, March 2022.
• Joshua Espinoza at Complex reports on Chuck D’s criticisms of The Jerry Springer Show, November 2019.
• Jerry Springer argues on Newsnight that he dos not exploit poor people, February 2014.
• Anna Peele at Vanity Fair reports on the suicides of Love Island hosts and guests, June 2022.
• Them: Adventures with Extremists: Secret Rulers of the World by Jon Ronson, December 2014.
• Christianna Silva at NPR reports on “activist burnout”, August 2020.
• Michelle Goldberg at The New York Times discusses how the past few years have left a generation feeling politically burned out, October 2021.
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Filed under: The 250 | Tagged: america, Bryan Cranston, capitalism, ciara moloney, dean buckley, donald trump, exploitation, faye dunaway, Fox, fox news, hippies, media, money, ned beatty, Network, networks, Oscars, Paddy Chayefsky, Peter Finch, power, ratings, reagan, Sidney Lumet, Television, the sundae, yuppies |