Network (1976)

It is often noted that, had Peter Finch not died, William Holden would have received a second Oscar to replace the one he had thrown into the Bay of Naples in a drunken lapse of judgement. And he would have had it for Network, one of his greatest pictures and his best roles.

I don’t know if that opinion is the truth, as Peter Finch was quite good as well in Network, but I have to admit that his ranting delivery of “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!” pales in comparison to the feats required of William Holden in this film. Holden, as Max Schumacher, was asked not only to participate in his first on-screen graphic sex scene at the age of 58, but also had an extended and excruciating break-up scene with his on-screen wife (which was good enough to win Beatrice Straight, the actress who played the wife, the Oscar for best supporting actress) that must have brought up more memories than he was comfortable with.

More than all this, there are indications that the WASP king of Pasadena was actually asked to try to portray a Jewish guy… Which should have won him the Oscar for transmutational magic, if you ask me.

But the long and the short of this is that this film, as an ensemble work, is an outstanding picture, and one of the greatest films ever made. As far as I’m concerned, the Oscar should have gone to Peter Finch and to William Holden, as well as to everyone else associated with this high-level satire on the already-in-1976-declining TV news industry. This film both amuses and challenges, and this is something very special.

Further, it has one of the most awesome kiss-off speeches ever committed to celluloid, when Holden’s character, a dedicated and old-fashioned news man, breaks it off with the young female TV producer he is living with (for whom he left his wife).

This speech is too good to pass up, and, heaven forbid, should you ever be in the situation of dumping someone, I feel it would be a mistake not to have this cutting and brilliant attack committed to memory for the occasion:

Max Schumacher: You need me. You need me badly. Because I'm your last contact with human reality. I love you. And that painful, decaying love is the only thing between you and the shrieking nothingness you live the rest of the day.

Diana Christensen: [hesitatingly] Then, don't leave me.

Max Schumacher: It's too late, Diana. There's nothing left in you that I can live with. You're one of Howard's humanoids. If I stay with you, I'll be destroyed. Like Howard Beale was destroyed. Like Laureen Hobbs was destroyed. Like everything you and the institution of television touch is destroyed. You're television incarnate, Diana: Indifferent to suffering; insensitive to joy. All of life is reduced to the common rubble of banality. War, murder, death are all the same to you as bottles of beer. And the daily business of life is a corrupt comedy. You even shatter the sensations of time and space into split seconds and instant replays. You're madness, Diana. Virulent madness. And everything you touch dies with you. But not me. Not as long as I can feel pleasure, and pain... and love. [Kisses her]

Max continues: And it's a happy ending: Wayward husband comes to his senses, returns to his wife, with whom he has established a long and sustaining love. Heartless young woman left alone in her arctic desolation. Music up with a swell; final commercial. And here are a few scenes from next week's show.
[Picks up his suitcases and leaves]

Man. That’s just cold.


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