A movie made 30 years ago that perfectly describes the situation today about television, news, and the main stream media. It resonates louder and sounds truer today that it did when the movie was made.

Howard Beale (played by Peter Finch) anchor scenes from the prophetic 1976 movie Network about the evolution, or rather, the rapid decline of the news media.

Chayefsky, the writer of this prescient masterpiece, seemed less to be writing from the power of his imagination, than channeling Our Times Now. As if he was capable of some form of mental time travel; able to look into the Nineties and beyond to see the coming of SURVIVOR, or Maury Povich, Jerry Springer, Bill O'Reilly and Paris Hilton. Even HE probably didn't know how he knew, but he sure as hell felt it and wrote it down for us to marvel over today.

Sure, there are political and cultural analogies throughout the picture that are dated. But the core of his vision remains startlingly clear and eerily prophetic. As for Howard Beale, there is not one single "celebrity" who mirrors that character today, but maybe he is a composite of several different personalities with whom we have become all too familiar in the world of "news-fo-tainment." Or maybe he simply hasn't materialized yet. Maybe that is just how far ahead of its time NETWORK really was.