“The world is a business Mr. Beale.” An unforgettable line, in an unforgettable scene from a classic 1976 movie, Network. Directed by Sidney Lumet, with a star-studded cast, it won 4 Oscars (Faye Dunaway for best actress, Peter Finch for best actor, Beatrice Straight for best supporting actress, and best original screenplay). I have never stopped thinking about it ever since I saw it when it first came out, and have since kept a DVD copy of it somewhere. The other day, however, when I watched it on TV again, it reminded me how visionary and ahead of its time the film was.
The story is a satire about the impact of television on the society (the US in this case), and how it has turned everything into a show and a drama, and how people have become numb and disconnected from the reality. In between, it also sends messages about how the business and the corporation have replaced countries and how people are angry, but all they can do is scream and express their anger.
Watching the film in the current context, I realized again how relevant many of its messages are today. You may have to change some of the company names, and augment the TV with social media and internet, but most of what the film depicted over 40 years ago, holds still today (even more so, perhaps).
All this sounds too depressing and negative? Maybe, but try to watch the film or at least click below on the link of a 5-minute snapshot of the film, and think of Uber & Amazon, hedge funds & pension funds, sleeping pills & Prozac type pills, and video games & reality shows, as you hear the lines:
All men will work to serve the common profit,
All men will hold a stock in the corporation,
All necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused,
This could have just as easily come out of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/V9XeyBd_IuA?rel=0&autoplay=0&showinfo=0&enablejsapi=0
Paris, March 24, 2021,
Zeejay