Sidney Lumet died this weekend aged 86.  I must admit I have not seen most of Lumet’s body of work but from the ones I have, I would not question his place among the greatest directors of the 20th Century.  His films are very dialog driven and have some of the best “verbal duels’ in cinema.  See 12 Angry Men for this.  Before last week I was most aware of Lumet for Dog Day Afternoon and Sepico both films that show how good an actor Al Picino is.  I love Dog Day Afternoon, a great film that builds tension as good as Scorsese but with great comedic moments that never distracts the drama.

However this week I saw Network for the first time and I loved it.  It is a film that holds so much relevance today that it’s amazing to think it was made in 1976.  Network is a film that plants the audience immediately in the environment of its fictional world.  The verbal duels are nothing but amazing to watch.

The film is about the Capitalisation of TV and the inevitable glorification of the News.  As the Network discovers how entertainment in its News programmes attracts them bigger audiences, we discover what lengths they will go to get our attention.  Thanks to Lumet’s skill we also witness the effects this has on the people involved and society as a whole.  The result is a great film that is certainly Left leaning in its political message.

With recent events around the world and in the UK in mind perhaps this speech from the film has been spread and people are beginning to get “Mad as Hell.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=q_qgVn-Op7Q