The Portrayal Of Truth In Sidney Lumet's Network

Sidney Lumet’s Network (1976) is a satirical film that attacks the American society created by the television industry in the 1970s. The main protagonist of the film, Howard Beale, is an aging UBS news anchorman with poor ratings. After learning that he is going to be fired, he announces during one of his broadcasts that he is going to kill himself on live television. Though the outraged network fires him immediately, Beale is offered a chance to apologize to the American public. However, once on air, he proclaims that life is “bullshit,” and is met with unexpected agreement and high ratings. After another segment where he inspires audiences to stand up for what they believe in, UBS rehires him and gives him his own talk show. As “the mad prophet of the airwaves,” Beales rakes in more ratings than any other show on the network. In turn, UBS—one of the few television network conglomerates—cynically exploits him in an “attempt to outstrip [other networks] to satisfy audience desires for the shocking, the profane and the rebellious” (Hesmondhalgh,

Horkheimer and Adorno argue that “It is not the portrayal of reality as hell on earth but the slick challenge to break out of it that is suspect” (1944, p. 182). Unaware that he is being exploited for the network’s financial gain, Beale truly believes in what he was preaching. Every taping, he gets in front of a live audience and expresses his concerns for the doomed society. Though in vain, he attempts to implore the American public to get up and do something about the world they live in. The public trusts what he says, and rise up to vocalize their needs and wants. This effort to break from the industry’s ideology is naive, as the network is only profiting from their viewership. Therefore, the challenge to break out of the reality that is portrayed as “hell on earth” is untrustworthy. The public is fighting against itself, and in the end, hegemony always