Broadcast News ReviewsBroadcast News
In James L. Brooks’ quirky, romantic comedy, three ambitious workaholics are set loose in a network TV newsroom where their professional and personal lives become hopelessly cross-wired. Tom (William Hurt) is the modern anchorman, smooth, handsome and a bit dumb. Jane (Holly Hunter) is his driven, brilliant producer, determined to turn Tom into a real newsman. And Aaron (Albert Brooks) is a seasoned, totally uncharismatic reporter who can’t stand Tom’s instant success on-camera or with Jane.
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(out of 44 reviews)
Review by Wes for Broadcast News
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While this is without question a 5-star film, the dvd leaves MUCH to be desired. Let me begin with the widescreen framing. I was happy to finally see this arrive on dvd in its proper wide format. Out of curiosity I took out my oft-played VHS copy and compared the compositions. Understanding that many 1.85:1 pictures are merely 1.33:1 aspects with mattes placed on the top and bottom of the frame, I wasn’t expecting to be too disappointed with the missing, albeit unintended, visual information. But I have to say – not only is the top and bottom masked off, but the SIDES are zoomed in and cropped as well. In other words you lose information on ALL FOUR SIDES, and it does NOT look good. This CANNOT be what James L. Brooks had in mind…could it?!?! Sorry to say, but this has to be one of the most RARE examples where the “full-frame”, that is, full aperture is preferred over the letterboxed edition. Which brings me to my next point: somebody PLEASE re-issue this as a Special Edition, replete with commentaries, and any extra footage. Finally, whoever, please, PLEASE re-frame this into a 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer. Widescreen is preferred, but on the existing dvd the framing is just too tight.
Review by for Broadcast News
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“. . . if desperation and insecurity made us attractive? If needy were a turn on?” Though Albert Brooks delivers this line, *Broadcast News* is not directed by him; it’s directed by JAMES Brooks (who also wrote and produced — truly a product of one creative mind, here). It’s a measure of how well James Brooks knows his 3 principal characters that the actors who play them speak as if they wrote their own dialogue. *Broadcast News* is a classic primarily because these characters are so completely realized, so lived-in, as it were. We end up knowing these characters nearly as well as they seem to know themselves (“I’ll meet you at the place near the thing where we went that time”). William Hurt is the not-terribly bright aspiring anchorman; Holly Hunter is the type-A news producer; and Albert Brooks is the reporter after “hard news” (meaning, REAL news). One reviewer here complained that he didn’t like Albert Brooks as much as he was “supposed to” and that Hurt’s character wasn’t villainous enough. But that’s the point. While we side with Brooks’ work ethics throughout, we are often disappointed in him, particularly when out of lovesick frustration he descends to cheap pettiness by rubbing his intellectual superiority in Hurt’s nose and says hurtful things to Hunter’s character. And while we disdain Hurt’s corner-cutting career ambitions, we’re also surprised at the man’s humaneness, as when he calls his father in a touching scene, joyously proclaiming, “Dad, I think I can do this job!” The point being, of course, that these are REAL people, presented in such a way as nowadays seems impossible in mainstream Hollywood productions. As if this wasn’t wonderful enough, the movie is interested in actual WORK: it’s quite educational on how a network news program is edited, staged, and generally put together, even providing the inside skinny on how to straighten the shoulders of one’s suit-jacket. And certainly the concern with ethics in journalism puts this romantic comedy on a far higher level than is usual with the genre. I’m talking a level on par with some of the great novelists of the 19th century, like Austen and Henry James and Trollope and Hardy. In other words, *Broadcast News* is nothing less than a formal comedy of manners . . . one of the best ever put on the screen. Oh, and by the way: the bittersweet ending is precise and true. Much like the rest of the movie.
Review by Bomojaz for Broadcast News
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A crackerjack of a movie, it’s an intelligent and very funny look at TV broadcast news and the people who bring it to us. William Hurt is the pretty face/no brains anchor, Albert Brooks the smart writer who wants to be an anchor but doesn’t have the talent, and Holly Hunter is the hyperactive producer who falls for both guys and loses both. So much is going on in this movie that repeated viewings reveal new insights and are always enjoyable. Great acting by all, and the script is terrific. The only fault, and it’s a minor one, is the epilogue: it’s superfluous. To me, this is one of the best, if not THE best, movies of the 80′s.
Review by C. Middleton for Broadcast News
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The media as purveyors of sensational ‘news’ in the spirit of good ‘salesmanship’ and entertainment as opposed to actually reporting unbiased, important events and issues to inform the public, that is journalism, as it was meant to be, is represented in this charming and witty film from the genius of James L. Brooks. (Terms of Endearment, As Good as it Gets) To be fair, some television news organizations attempt to report important events as they happen, avoiding sensationalism, the need to entertain, and maintain a modicum of integrity. But television news is more and more about the dazzling visual, the shocking three- minute sound bite between the all-important advertisements. This film cleverly addresses the question on what is ‘real’ news and what ‘sells’. In the past we sort of had a clue or at least a choice as to what news source was credible, i.e., tabloid-ism and/or serious journalism. It all seems now to be blurred – sensationalism, gossip, opinion, selling and the so-called ‘facts’ of an event or issue has now appeared to all have melded together in the pursuit of market share and the almighty dollar. The character, Tom, (William Hurt) is a striving newsreader, and after reading sports at a local station, manages to land a job at one of the big networks. He is a little slow, can’t write, and wouldn’t know a real story if it dropped on his head, but he’s good looking, personable, can at least read, and above all, has the innate ability to sell the birds off the trees. Here is the new force in television journalism – news anchor as television star. Then there is Aaron, (Albert Brooks) the reporter’s reporter – brilliant, serious, idealistic and wholly uncharismatic in the popular sense. Although a writer with Pulitzer Prize ability, he attempts to read the news one Sunday night and almost drowns in his own flop sweat. Aaron is not a newsreader but a true writer and investigative journalist, a man who believes in the integrity of his profession. Then, of course, there’s Jane, (Holly Hunter) a highly-strung, also brilliant, obsessive news producer, who shares this same idealistic integrity about journalism as her co-worker and best friend, Aaron. The film is about these three diverse and colourful individuals, who are drawn together for the same reasons, ambition and the news, but whose ideas about the news, their values concerning integrity, at least for one, are so different. This film is also about love, relationships and how the passionate desires of the heart do not necessarily match the logic of the head. At the time of it release, this film was acclaimed as the best romantic comedy to come out in years. It continues to be enormously entertaining and the issues it raises are relevant today. The film truly depicts the world of television news, how its standards have slowly dropped from reporting the events and issues to entertaining us with gossip, sensationalism and that all-important dazzling visual – news is now about entertainment and selling. This is a film that should be pulled from the shelf occasionally and watched to remind us about integrity, maintaining a high standard in our values, and what great movie making is all about. Five Stars.
Review by Mr. Cairene for Broadcast News
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Broadcast News is one of those films that makes you feel like you’ve had a perfect meal. Its makes you feel content and grateful that a film could be so perfect. On the surface this is called a romantic-comedy, a genre muddied buy wittless trash like Picture Perfect but this film is as(for lack of a better word) deep as they come. Yes it is at times funny, but all three leads are very and even painfully real. Holly Hunter periodically disconnecting the phone, crying for a while and then giong back to work, sounds overtly cutsy, but as performed it somehow fits. Albert Brooks (in his best role) is a knock-out, he plays a reporter who is gifted/nuerotic/disposable and very much in love with Holly Hunter. He has this unforgettable speech about Tom(William Hurt) being the devil where he is “semi-serious” that manages to be over the top hilarious and unbearably sad. William Hurt, in his string of great 80s performance plays Tom, a man of low I.Q. but a deep understanding of life, he is the subject of Holly Hunters loathing and affection. These three set the stage for a perfect morality play, a realistic expose of life in network news, its politics and the cost career driven people have to pay. As a critique of network news, I liked this film better than Sidney Lumet’s NETWORK becuase that film wet completely over the top in its final quarter, Broadcast News’s approach on the other hand is through real characters that we can symphasise with. This is director James L.Brooks’s best film. I can only count four he made, most recently As Good As It Gets.That film is just a lighthearted unrealistic if highly enjoyable comedy, and it does not nearly come close to the depth of this film. Broadcast News is a great film.