James L. Brooks | Through the Shattered Lens

(For those following at home, Lisa is attempting to clean out her DVR by watching and reviewing 38 films by the end of this Friday. Will she make it? Keep following the site to find out!)

I’ll give you three chances to guess what the 1987 film Broadcast News is about.

Broadcast News takes place at the Washington bureau of a major network news operation. (You can tell this film was made in the 80s in that nobody’s working for a blog and there’s no mention of Fox, MSNBC, or CNN.) This is where a group of hard-working men and women do their best to make the national news anchor, Bill Rorish, look good.

Bill Rorish is played by Jack Nicholson and, even though he only has about five minutes of screen time (out of a 133 minute movie), he pretty much dominates the entire film. Some of that is because he’s Jack Nicholson and he kicks ass. All Jack has to do to dominate a scene is show up and arch an eyebrow. But, beyond that, everyone in the movie is obsessed with impressing Bill Rorish. Whenever a reporter and his producer get a story on the air, they obsessively watch to see if Bill smiles afterward. Bill Rorish is the God they all hope to please and the film (as well as Nicholson’s performance) suggests that he barely even knows that they’re alive. It’s telling that the only time Bill shows up in person (as opposed to appearing on a TV screen), it’s because a huge number of people at the Washington bureau are being laid off.

When Bill says that it’s a shame that budget cuts are leading to so many good newspeople being laid off, someone suggests that maybe Bill could help by taking a cut in his million-dollar salary. Needless to say, Bill Rorish is not amused.

Broadcast News centers on three of the characters who work at the Washington Bureau. First off, there’s Jane Craig (Holly Hunter), a producer. Jane is a true believer in the mission and the importance of journalism. Her ethics and her belief in what constitutes proper journalism are everything to her and, at times, she can get more than a little self-righteous about it. (If Broadcast News were made today, Jane would spend the entire movie whining about how new media is destroying the country.) At the same time, Jane is completely neurotic, a self-described “basket case” who, at one point, ends up sobbing in a hotel room as she prepares to go to sleep by herself.

Jane’s best friend is Aaron Altman (Albert Brooks), a reporter who wants to someday be an anchor. Aaron is smart and funny (and he better be, seeing as how he’s being played by Albert Brooks) but he’s not telegenic and he’s almost as neurotic as Jane. Like Jane, Aaron is all about journalistic ethics but there’s a defensiveness to Aaron. Whenever Aaron complains about vapid news anchors, it’s obvious that he’s more jealous than outraged.

And then there’s Tom Grunick (William Hurt), who represents everything that Jane and Aaron claim to be against. He’s handsome, he’s smooth, he’s charismatic, and he’s definitely not an intellectual. He knows little about the specifics of current events. However, he has great instincts. He knows how to sell a story and he knows how to present himself on camera. He’s also a surprisingly nice and sincere guy, which makes it all the more difficult for Aaron to justify his belief that “Tom is the devil.”

From the minute that Tom arrives at the Washington bureau, there’s a strong attraction between Tom and Jane. (Jane even sends another reporter to Alaska after she finds out that Tom slept with her.) Tom wants to be a better reporter. Jane wants to be happy but fears compromising her ethics. And Aaron … well, Aaron wants Jane.

Not surprisingly, considering that the film was made 29 years ago, there were some parts of Broadcast News that felt extremely dated. A scene where Aaron complains about a story that Tom did on date rape feels especially uncomfortable when viewed today and both Jane and Aaron occasionally came across as being a bit too self-righteous. In today’s media world, Tom’s sins really didn’t seem like that big of a deal.

But, for the most part, I enjoyed Broadcast News. It was an intelligent film, one the featured people having actual conversations about actual ideas and, listening to them, I realized how rare, in both movies and real life, that actually is. It’s a witty film, full of good performances. While I hope I never become as self-righteous as Jane, I could still relate to her in her more neurotic moments. And who wouldn’t want a best friend like Aaron?

And, for that matter, who wouldn’t want a lover like Tom?

(That’s something I never expected to write about a character played by William Hurt.)

And, of course, there’s this scene. Poor Aaron!

Broadcast News was nominated for best picture of 1987. However, it lost to The Last Emperor.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPjx2pI–2U

I have to admit that, when I first sat down and watched the 1983 best picture winner Terms of Endearment, I was actually taken by surprise. Before I actually saw it, I was under the impression that Terms of Endearment was considered to be one of the weaker films to win best picture. I had read a few reviews online that were rather dismissive of Terms, describing it as being well-made but overrated.

But then, a few weeks ago, I watched Terms of Endearment on Netflix. The film started with a scene of new mother Aurora Greenwood (Shirley MacClaine) obsessively checking on her daughter, Emma. Stepping into the bedroom, Aurora is, at first, scared that Emma’s dead. Without bothering to take off her high heels, Aurora nearly climbs into the crib to check on her. Fortunately, Emma starts to cry.

And I laughed because I’ve been told about how my mom used to obsessively check in on me when I was a baby. And, while my mom was never the type to wear high heels around the house, I could still imagine her climbing into a crib to check on me and my sisters.

And then, when Emma (now played by Debra Winger) married Flap Horton (a very young Jeff Daniels) over the objections of her mother, I smiled but I didn’t laugh because, in this case, I was relating to Emma. Because the fact of the matter is that every girl has known a boy like Flap Horton, the smart and funny guy who is destined to ultimately hurt her.

And when Flap got a job in Des Moines and Emma moved from Houston to Iowa, I knew — as did Aurora — what was going to happen. I knew that Flap would deal with his insecurity over not being a good provider for his wife and children by cheating on his wife. And when he did, I wanted to cry with Emma.

But then I wanted to cheer when Emma has an affair of her own. In the role of Sam, John Lithgow doesn’t have much screen time in Terms of Endearment but he does get the best line. When a rude cashier claims that she doesn’t feel that she was being rude to Emma, Sam replies, “Then you must be from New York.”

Meanwhile, the widowed Aurora is having an affair of her own. Jack Nicholson plays Garrett Breedlove, a former astronaut who now has both a drinking problem and a house with a pool. Garrett gets Aurora to loosen up. Aurora makes Garrett realize that he actually is capable of being a decent guy. MacClaine and Nicholson both won Oscars for their performances here and they deserved them.

And then, Emma was diagnosed with cancer. And I cried and cried because, at this point, I had come to think of Emma and Aurora as being real people. And when Emma told her friends that she was dying and she spent her final days with her children, I sobbed because it made me think about my mom. And now I’m sobbing as I write this review.

But it’s a great film, even if it did make me cry. Because, in the end, you’re glad that you got to know these characters. And, even through the tears, the film leaves you happy that you got to spend some time with them.

And isn’t that what a great film is supposed to do?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY0GM9KHU8o