Cinemaball 13: Broadcast News (1987)

Explicit content warning

09/14/18 • 63 min

Fifth entry to the Second Round: This week on Cinemaball, Carolyn and Ebony take a close look at James L. Brooks’ 1987 masterpiece about the collision between professional ethics and personal desires, Broadcast News. The film features Holly Hunter in a breakthrough performance as news producer Jane Craig, a woman fiercely dedicated to maintaining high ethical standards for herself and her news crew, who finds herself falling for a man who represents everything she’s been fighting against. Meanwhile, another colleague, one who shares her ethical commitment, finds his love for her unreciprocated.

Listen as we discuss the film’s ethical explorations, its simultaneously sparkling and razor-sharp wit, and the ways in which it defies romantic comedy conventions. We each offer up handpicked suggestions for cinematic pairings with this film in our segment Sommovier, and Ebony makes a stunning announcement that may change Cinemaball forever.

For more great insight into Broadcast News, read critic Carrie Rickey’s excellent essay Lines and Deadlines, written to accompany the Criterion Collection release of the film: http://www.carrierickey.com/artlcles/broadcast-news-lines-and-deadlines/

Cinemaball is presented by Feminist Frequency
Executive Produced and hosted by Carolyn Petit and Ebony Aster
Produced and edited by Sarah Nairalez
Artwork by Raye Abellar
Hosted by Simplecast
Executive Produced by Anita Sarkeesian

Includes audio clips from
The Legend of Billie Jean and Broadcast News

Music by Broke For Free

View the basic rules of Cinemaball and a history of all our episodes and ratings at http://goo.gl/ePDPuQ

Includes audio clips from
The Legend of Billie Jean and Broadcast News

Music by Broke For Free

View the basic rules of Cinemaball and a history of all our episodes and ratings at http://goo.gl/ePDPuQ

Previous Episode

Cinemaball 12: Raising Arizona (1987)

On the latest Cinemaball, Ebony and Carolyn venture to the deserts of the Coen brothers’ 1987 comedy classic, Raising Arizona. We get into Nicolas Cage’s indelible performance as a kind of living cartoon, the peculiar nature of this film’s American dream as a land where all of us can find grace, and the film’s impatience with certain specific types of masculinity. We also discuss the meticulous nature of the filmmaking on display, what exposure to filmmakers like the Coen brothers can do, and Carolyn talks about the ways in which it’s sometimes inevitable that a numerical rating will fail to adequately reflect our complex feelings about a work of art.

Includes audio clips from
The Legend of Billie Jean, The Running Man and Raising Arizona

Music by Broke For Free

View the basic rules of Cinemaball and a history of all our episodes and ratings at http://goo.gl/ePDPuQ

Next Episode

Cinemaball 14: The Legend of Billie Jean (1985)

Sixth entry to the Second Round: On this very special episode of Cinemaball, we celebrate Ebony’s achievement of scoring the first proper goal in the history of the game with an examination of her goal film, the overlooked 1985 teen power ballad of a movie that is The Legend of Billie Jean. Our conversation covers the film’s noteworthy respect for its young heroes (and, by extension, its young viewers, too), the unique power of a female hero who disrupts the gender binary, and the role that male entitlement plays as a force of evil, among other things. As always, we each rate the film according to Ebony’s brother’s patented 100-star system, and then discuss the future of Cinemaball.

Current score of Cinemaball:
Ebony: 5
Carolyn: 3

Music by Broke For Free

View the basic rules of Cinemaball and a history of all our episodes and ratings at: http://goo.gl/ePDPuQ