Broadcast News James L. Brooks Digital Life VHS

Broadcast News
starring: William Hurt, Albert Brooks, Holly Hunter, Robert Prosky, Lois Chiles
directed by: James L. Brooks

Used Price: $0.99
Collectible Price: $20.00
Third Party New Price: $12.95

Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 5013738165458
Format: PAL
Number Of Discs: 1
Sales Rank: 99285
Theatrical Release Date: December 16, 1987

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Editorial Review:

Amazon.com essential video:
Holly Hunter plays a network news producer who, much to her chagrin, finds herself falling for pretty-boy anchorman William Hurt. He is all glamour without substance and represents a hated shift from hard news toward packaged 'infotainment,' which Hunter despises. Completing the triangle is Albert Brooks, who provides contrast as the gifted reporter with almost no presence on camera. He carries a torch for Hunter; she sees merely a friend. Written and directed by James L. Brooks, this shows remarkable insight into the people who make television. On the surface it is about that love triangle. If you look a little deeper, however, you will see that this behind-the-scenes comedy is a very revealing look at obsessive behavior and the heightened emotions that accompany adrenaline addiction. It is for good reason this was nominated for seven Academy Awards (though it did not win any). There are scenes in this movie you cannot shake, such as Hunter's scheduled mini-breakdowns, or Brooks's furious 'flop sweat' during his tryout as a national anchor. Watch for an uncredited Jack Nicholson as a senior newscaster. --Rochelle O'Gorman

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Customer Reviews

Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- The truth, and nothing but the truth...
Wildly witty and richly textured with raw human connection; James L. Brooks' comedic masterpiece `Broadcast News' is most definitely one of a kind.

Well, talk about spilling it all in the opening sentence. I don't even know how to follow that up.

The film centers around three working bodies. You have Tom Grunick, the pretty boy turned TV-Reporter who is embittered with himself for being too good. He has a knack for something that he doesn't quite understand and it causes him to feel less than deserving; but it's apparently a mock-humility, as if he's searching for manipulated sympathies. Then you have Aaron Altman, a very gifted and passionate reporter who lacks the presence and connection that Tom so effortlessly oozes. He is battling his own insecurities as he is surely battling himself, trying to put up a front and become something he's not sure he wants to be. Stuck in the middle ... Read More

Rating:

- A Classic--Excels In Every Way
I saw this when it first came out in 1987, and remembered liking it. Watched it again last week, and liked it even more. Its achievement is that it is able to tell a compelling personal story (a love triangle of sorts) at the same time that it takes a snapshot of a pivotal moment in time in an industry critical to American democracy. It's very different from Network, which mixes black humor and over-the-top satire with a couple of personal stories and a cheesy, poorly realized romance, but the two taken together can tell you a lot about where American news media went wrong. I think James L. Brooks' script and direction are topnotch, and the three principals, Hunter, (Albert) Brooks, and Hurt are all good. Hunter is brilliant, and Brooks is as real and convincing as he has ever been in anything!

So many movies tack on the romance as an artificial way of generating audience interest. But this movie makes ... Read More

Rating:

- Never forget, WE'RE the story...
The only movie worthy of being paired with Paddy Chayefsky's Network. Yes, James L. Brooks is brilliant (isn't that a given?), but the man's a prophetic wizard, too, because in this single film, he correctly predicted the downard slide of our modern news business.

Of course, Chayefsky did this years earlier in Network (news as entertainment; hijacking of "objectivity" for political agenda; ratings ruling and overruling everything; news "stars" in front of cameras mattering more to "corporate" than good writing and reporting). Chayefsky's take, however, is much darker, less human, and does push the envelope of credulity. Broadcast News is all too accurate. Eerily accurate. If you haven't seen it, you sure should (and Network, too, if you haven't - a great double feature).

Rating:

- One of the 80's Best
Every once in a while Hollywood hits one out of the park. See this movie.

In a decade mostly unremarkable in terms of cinematic history, "Broadcast News" stands out like a polished gem. There isn't a single aspect of the film---acting, writing, directing---that can be faulted.

Too, it is a rare Hollywood offering which is actually ABOUT something---in this case, the gradual transforming of a television news department into just another cache of profits and entertainment. All of the characters play their roles skillfully yet humanly and no one is a cardboard cutout.

Director James Brooks passed on any availably facile plot lines and let the story take its own difficult, rocky road, to great artistic advantage. So many directors would have contrived a glossy romantic wrapup to the film and Brooks, to his credit, resisted that temptation.

Jack Nicholson makes a cameo in ... Read More

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