Broadcast News movie review & film summary (1987)

I know all about that kind of obsession. (You don't think I'm turning this review in early, do you?) "Broadcast News" understands it from the inside out, and perhaps the most interesting sequence in the whole movie is a scene where a network news producer sweats it out with a videotape editor to finish a report that is scheduled to appear on the evening news in 52 seconds. In an atmosphere like that, theoretical questions get lost. The operational reality, day after day, is to get the job done and beat the deadline and make things look as good as possible. Positive feedback goes to people who deliver. Yesterday's job is forgotten. What have you got for me today?

Right at the center of "Broadcast News" is a character named Jane Craig (Holly Hunter), who is a news writer-producer for the Washington bureau of a TV network. She is smart and fast, and she cherishes certain beliefs about TV news - one of them being that a story should be covered by the person best-qualified to cover it.

One of her best friends is Aaron Altman (Albert Brooks), a bright, aggressive reporter. He's one of the best in the business, but he's not especially good on camera. During a trip South, she meets Tom Grunick (William Hurt), a sportscaster who cheerfully admits he has little education, is not a good reader, and doesn't know much about current events. But he has been hired for the Washington bureau because he looks good and has a natural relationship with the camera.

The Hunter character is only human. She is repelled by this guy's credentials, but she likes his body. After he comes to Washington, he quickly gains the attention of the network brass, while the Brooks character goes into eclipse. Hunter is torn between the two men: Brooks, who says he loves her and is the better reporter, and Hurt, who says he wants to learn, and who is sexier.

The tricky thing about "Broadcast News" - the quality in director James L. Brooks' screenplay that makes it so special - is that all three characters have a tendency to grow emotionally absent-minded when it's a choice between romance and work. Frankly, they'd rather work. After Hunter whispers into Hurt's earpiece to talk him through a crucial live report on a Middle East crisis, he kneels at her feet and says it was like sex, having her voice inside his head. He never gets that excited about sex. Neither does she.