1 post tagged “network”
I've just watched a great movie: Network. It's such a great movie that it is the only movie for which an actor has posthumously been awarded a best actor Oscar. Peter Finch's performance as Howard Beale trumped all other performances for 1976.
The rest of the movie: the plot, the characterisation, and so on was OK but it was Peter Finch's oratory that made the film. And what it reminded me of was something I learned in English class when we studied Shakespeare.
Elizabethan England wasn't Hollywood and there were no sets or special effects. The focus was on the way the actors spoke the lines and not on their costumes or physicality. Texts from the time talk of people going to the theatre to listen to a play rather than to watch. Hence the fantastic soliloquies and speeches.
Listen to these two speeches with your eyes closed and you won't miss a thing. Network was about the oratory and it would make a great radio play.
