Best Actress: Faye Dunaway

 Man, they thought the state of television news was bad in 1976, huh? 

via prettynerdieworks

Imagine what they'd think of today's news landscape!

Network is such a sublime film, speaking as someone with a background in journalism. It's a sharp social commentary, a biting satire on the state of television news versus television ratings, and everyone in this film elevates it with their talents. 

You know how some movies win Oscars and you're like, "Oh yeah, that's a great movie but I doubt I'd ever rewatch it?" That's not the case with Network, I genuinely enjoy it. I love that it has a message, it has a sharp satirical bent towards ratings over reason and what happens when you sacrifice everything for the sake of views. I love that the script is so sharply written it doesn't bother to explain anything to you in laymen's terms. If you get it, you get it; if you don't, it sounds like career professionals speaking rather than actors studying a script. It's a great film with a great message, but it's also a perfectly acted film, with everyone delivering career-best work.

Which leads me to Faye Dunaway, who won Best Actress for her portrayal of Diana Christensen, the calculating and obsessive head of programming at UBS. She'll stop at nothing to increase the ratings and the viewership, including turning the news into entertainment. She was a prophet, basically, because all news has a gimmick these days. 

From the jump, Diana is interested only in increasing the audience. What we learn about her personally is delivered as asides, as ways to explain away how she's cut weakness out of her life. A sex scene is reduced to her dirty talking television jargon until she finds release. She's brash, she's direct, she's got the overpowering need to win, to succeed, to be at the top. She's the kind of woman men expect/expected us to be in the workforce, and it's biting that she only succeeds and continues to fail upwards in this satire. Any other woman probably would've been fired for the ratings slip, thrown to the wolves and replaced by a mediocre white man. Not Diana!

I've read that Sidney Lumet, the director, told Faye not to put any emotion into her portrayal and that if she did, he'd cut it out in the editing room. That Faye could play Diana so coldly, so convincingly and still have a comic edge to it is a testament to her talent.

Network earned five acting nominations and three wins: Faye Dunaway; Peter Finch, who won Best Actor posthumously for his portrayal of Howard Beale, the news broadcaster who is about to be fired for poor ratings until he announces that he's going to commit suicide live on air and then delivers a jaw-dropping speech on 'bullshit' that leads to him becoming a ratings darling; and Beatrice Straight, who won Best Supporting Actress for five minutes of screentime in which she lambasts William Holden, her on-screen husband, for an affair with Diana. 

William Holden was also nominated for Best Actor for his role as Max Schumacher, the news director, and I so love his performance. Peter Finch was the bombast though, while William Holden was a more muted performance, so it makes sense that Finch was rewarded. Ned Beatty (who I know as the voice of Lots-o'-Huggin' Bear from Toy Story 3 and nothing else) was nominated for a five-minute performance as the chairman of the company that owns UBS in the Best Supporting Actor category. 

Bottom line: Network is a great film, a great acting showcase, and it has a message that's still prescient today. I'd definitely recommend it; and I'd recommend the book about the making of the film, Mad as Hell: The Making of Network and the Fateful Vision of the Angriest Man in Movies by Dave Itzkoff. It's an incisive read on all the talents that went into making this masterpiece. 

Faye was nominated against Marie-Christine Barrault (Cousin Cousine), Talia Shire (Rocky), Sissy Spacek (Carrie), and Liv Ullmann (Face to Face). Of these actresses, Marie-Christine Barault is the only one I'm unfamiliar with. What a line-up of talent, though of these films I've only seen Network and Rocky. Faye undoubtedly deserved her win.

DID I LIKE NETWORK? Yes! I love Network, it's one of my favourite New Hollywood films and it should be required viewing today.
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Did you like Network? What are your thoughts on Faye Dunaway's Oscar win?

Keep up with all my Rewatching the Best Actresses posts here!