(Apr 29, 2023 ● Oslin Pierrette)
This film was a great one, I have this currently on my 10 greatest films. I loved the dialogue, what this film was speaking to. This film was amazingly held together by some of the greatest, most honest, illuminating, and beautiful monologues. The performances were so craftfully amazing.
You start out with an instrument of the lifeless, formulaic, apathetic network, Howard Beale. He gets fired, his last week of work. He seems soulless, and there’s nothing in the world worth meaning for him. He might as well end it all, there’s no purpose left. In announcing that, he’s stopped and immediately taken off the air. There’s something about imminent chaos, oncoming danger. Also the destruction of your comfortability, your stability, where you don’t have to protect it anymore. Inhibitions go out the window.
Who cares to live as a formulaic incarcerated human being. Living within the lines is safe and stable, but the predictability can cause lifelessness. Getting outside the lines can be dangerous, it’s not as protected, risky, but there’s chances for new life. And Howard went way off the ledge. He found that zone of proximity between chaos and order that sparked life into him again. It was like he was reborn. Through truth is the way to light, which was imbued into him. He came in contact with real intimations of meaning. He encountered an inkling of purpose in life. Basically honest beautiful chaotic madness displayed live on the air.
It was messy, it was chaotic, it seemed crazy, but it was real. Which shocked the nation. With how formulaic and dormant society and media has been. It was an amazing spectacle, even though it was messy, it was real. It displayed the temperament of the state of the nation. They’ve been silent for too long. Letting life pass them by, and seeing all the mischief of the world just being a slap in their faces. Humans are just tired of it. And Howard became the voice of the unheard and angry. It was enlightening for them to see something real. He ignited the nation, woke them up. They are absolutely engaged. And the network loves it. They’ve been looking for outrage, they’ve been looking for provocative, they’ve been looking for something to spark the ratings. And now they have Howard. He went from being fired to the red carpet being rolled out for him. Then you see how fiscally everything is. All that matters is ratings, profit, sponsors. You see the construct of these network TV incarnate humanoids. These execs live in empty meaningless desolation. They are just addicted to hits, upward going graphs, high ratings, and they don’t care how, they don’t care how destructive their practices are, they don’t care too much out of themselves to see or even care about the effect they are having on the nation.
The media and network has a massive effect on the nation’s mind frame. Like Howard stated in his monologue, a large part of the masses knows nothing outside of the tube(TV/Media). The media and television is one of the most powerful mechanisms ever. To the point the television becomes the reality, and true reality becomes meaningless and non-stimulating. Can only be engaged and stimulated by the tube. We become what we consume, and we consume whatever The Networks deem profitable. If The Network deems outrage, insanity, madness, and absurdity profitable, that’s what we will be consuming, and then become those aspects. We become it through inspiration, constant messaging & programming. You feel that madness throughout the nation, throughout society. America has been sold a bill of goods, and our reality has become or for a long while has alway been an illusion. Most of what we know, our values, our currency, our relationships, our education, our history, our media, most of it isn’t true. We don’t deal in truths and untruths, we aren’t foundationed in morals and ethics. We deal in profit and no profit, that’s the ultimate decider of our livelihoods. Follow the money, and you’ll simply understand the truth of the world we live in. You’ll clearly see the movement from the Oligarchy Collective, Commodification of everything, and this absolute war against nature.
These corporate execs are only stimulated by meaningless upward numeric values. Until their volatile practices backfired on them. They wanted provocative TV from Howard which was truth, but they got more truth. Truth that many weren’t even keen too. Exposing and destructive truth to the network and government. The truth is volatile and chaotic. Doesn’t matter what lines you cross, as long as you don’t cross corporate lines that affect their profit. And that’s really when you see the construct of the world.
The construct of the people that rule a lot of this world. Outside of money, control, and power there is nothing. Nothing else matters, and that’s the construct for these execs and higher ups. That is the currency, as long as it goes up, nothing else matters. They live under a destructive monetary construct that is perpetuated to the masses. Money(also power) makes everything and everything makes money, outside of everything that is money, is nothing, according to the Oligarchy Collective.
Feelings aren’t stable, they come and go, feelings can be fickle. You can’t be mad all the time, you can’t keep the nation mad and outraged. Due to the volatility of Howard, he went from anger and engaging, to sobering and his flame started to be extinguished. The ratings dropped. And since they dropped, what is the purpose of Howard now? He means nothing to these people anymore. So there’s no answer that’s coming to them, besides their perspective to kill him. There’s no rules, there’s no morals, just ratings and money. So set up an ominous death for Howard Beale, and that’s just the Network.
I loved that interaction between Max and Diana. She’s absolutely desensitized to feeling and emotion. There’s no pain or love to her construct, just and absolute indifference. Yes she’s immune to pain, but she’s also immune to joy and happiness, which is that silver lining that is death, the living death. The apathetic living of meaningless. The only thing available is intermittent sex, no strings attached. She’s an empty desolation, network TV incarnated humanoid. All she has for herself is to spark ratings for the network, without that, she will completely fall apart. This is the construct of her existence. She’s addicted and her lifeline is dependent on this game. Doesn’t matter how destructive it is to humanity, it is her only lifeline. And there are a lot of exec humanoids like her. And the world, especially a place like America, they’re just a conglomerate of corporations run by these people. A humanoid takeover. They possess flesh that makes them seem human, but they don’t possess the humanity that real humans possess, a soulless construct. They plague the world. Only has access to surfaceable pleasures, living a life of hedonism. Psychopaths, humanoids, or narcissist can only live for their hedonistic god, the only thing that makes sense in their construct, the only thing they have.
It’s like humans have the line between life and death, where they seemingly have the choice of heaven and hell, and that’s based off their life choices, and how they live their lives. They have a chance for heaven, meaning hope for heaven for many. Many wanting to live for good…Where for psychopaths and humanoids, there is no line that separates that life and death for them. They were given hell, and it’s evident. There is evidently no access to heaven. Which means no reason to live good, no understanding or gauge for it. If someone is doomed to hell, might as well make it as pleasurable as possible, that’s all they have. It’s less of a choice, and more all they really got. It just seems some people on Earth were damned to hell from their birth or early years. They were cursed, they didn’t ask for it. That’s not to empathize their constant empty desolation suffering. It’s just to understand they have been plagued with hell, that they want to project to the world.
That was such an amazing line by Max, about as long as he’s still able to feel pleasure, but also pain, and love, there’s still meaning and life that matters to live.
Wow