Network

It is perhaps embarrassing to admit that I had never seen Network, and this year — its fiftieth anniversary — felt as good a time as any, especially considering how intimately familiar I already was with the film's plot, its two capstone monologues, and its general influence on culture and, if not journalism itself, then the lens through which we view journalism. And now, having watched it and spent a few days really chewing on what I thought and what I think it means, I have arrived at an idiosyncratic answer: Institutions, even the ones we revere, will be consumed by forces greater than human understanding. And in so doing, they also consume anyone who has devoted themself fully to those institutions. The film opens with Howard Beale becoming a childless widower whose sole identity is suddenly that of his news broadcast. Max Schumacher's fall from grace coincides with an off-screen decision not to go with his wife to Seattle to visit his pregnant daughter — instead staying behind in…