Since when is this a romcom? I thought it was a satire on news programing. Boring and unfulfilling. Albert Brooks doing his hang dog routine.

Why did I forget that Jack Nicholson is in this movie? Anyway, I'm glad I left a ten-year job working in television news because doing the live broadcasts was always so stressful.

Broadcast News is a very good film that may not be the most comedic or deep, but ultimately tells a compelling story and features an amazing performance by the always great Albert Brooks.

Broadcast News is my favorite romcom by a long shot. It’s hilarious, witty, relatable, and it has aged extremely well. In fact, in 2024, its themes feel even more prescient than they must have in 1987. Broadcast News is a workplace romantic comedy, and it is specifically a journalism centered romantic comedy, placing it within a tradition going back to His Girl Friday. Just like in His Girl Friday, journalism and the ethics of journalism are just as important to the film as the character’s romantic entanglements. Broadcast News also plays with elements of satire throughout its runtime, subverting typical romcom tropes in favor of an engaging exploration of workplace romance, jealousy, and the degradation of news media. It’s the kind of movie that shows the full potential of the romantic comedy genre, and it never fails to make me laugh and think, often simultaneously. The film tells the story of Jane, a news producer in D.C, Aaron, her coworker and best friend, and Tom, a charismatic news anchor who represents everything Jane hates about the growing sensationalism of the news. This story is told through an immensely clever screenplay, and the dialogue throughout the movie feels natural and incredibly funny without ever feeling forced. The main characters are artfully written, and they each feel relatable and flawed in their own way. The film begins by showing the audience small snippets from each of the main three characters' childhood's, giving us the perfect nugget of insight into the kind of people they will each eventually become. Jane is neurotic and a bit of an emotional mess, but she is also a determined and hardworking woman with strong principles. Holly Hunter’s performance is a masterclass, and her mix of power and vulnerability make Jane one of the best female characters in a comedy movie. Aaron is just as sympathetic as he is detestable, and Albert Brooks makes him so likable that you continue to feel bad for him even when he reveals his hidden cruelty. Tom, played by William Hurt, gets by on his looks and natural magnetism, but his seemingly genuine determination to improve makes him feel like a fully fleshed out character as opposed to a caricature. Instead of falling into lazy cliches, the love triangle at the heart of the film is used to subvert audience expectations. The movie specifically subverts the age old trope of the “nice guy” getting the girl as some reward. Although I won’t spoil the specifics, I’ve always loved the fact that the film doesn’t make Jane compromise her values or her autonomy for the sake of a fairytale ending. Jane has excellent chemistry with both Aaron and Tom, but chemistry cannot conquer all, and Broadcast News doesn’t shy away from this reality. The film’s love triangle also helps to clearly illustrate its important message about the corruption of journalism through the juxtaposition between Tom and Aaron. In 2024, this warning has never felt more relevant. The line between factual reporting and shocking entertainment television has become nearly nonexistent, and the Toms of the world are certainly in the driver’s seat. In our current political landscape, it's clear that it matters more how you say something than what you actually say, and faith in journalism has become so eroded that the good reporting that we have left is ignored in favor of snappy headlines and social media posts. Watching Broadcast News is like watching the first bit of water leak through a dam, knowing that a flood is yet to come. Despite the fact that it was very critically acclaimed in its time, I think a lot of people from my generation have never heard of Broadcast News, and that’s a shame. It’s expertly written, acted, and it holds up insanely well to time and scrutiny. It’s certainly worth a watch, even if you aren’t the kind of person who watches a lot of romcoms. This is a really special film that has something unique and important to say, and it deserves to be celebrated to this day.

Like all William Hurt films, this was full of chat, whilst there was little gripping plot to keep me interested. Just a standard office politics drama. Found it well acted but boring. Watched on DVD.

Why’d I go downstairs?

I think this was the first time I really fell in love with a movie! I missed 18 months of high school because of a horrible case of mono at the time this movie came out on video. I was so smitten, I watched it at least once a day for probably a couple weeks. It was as perfect a movie as I had seen up to that point, and the three lead characters felt like part of my family. Hunter gives one of the great screen performances ever, in my opinion, and although the character was written for another actress (Debra Winger), you can't imagine anyone else in the part. The behind the scenes stuff is fascinating and seems authentic, the intelligent dialogue absolutely crackles, and this was the apex of James L. Brooks as a director, even superior to his Oscar winning TERMS OF ENDEARMENT. I still quote lines regularly from this film, and it will forever be etched in my movie-loving soul.

The perfect mix between an art-house ending and an 80's romance, James L. Brooks' film "Broadcast News" is a true classic to behold. One could give Mr. Brooks an honorary film award simply for the ending, if one knew the backstory and controversy surrounding it. The three main stars, William Hurt, Holly Hunter, and Albert Brooks, contrive their performances into a surreal sort of being, acting out their roles to the utmost extent. Hunter's performance is the best in the picture, and deserves recognition for her hilarious ferocity. This film is brilliant.

Broadcast News (1987) provided audiences with two impressive accomplishments. The most important being a tight, well written, finely directed, and superbly acted story. The second accomplishment was casting Holly Hunter in a role that would provide her with a break-out performance she was very deserving of. Jane Craig (Hunter) is a high-strung yet remarkably talented news director. She works closely with Aaron Altman (Albert Brooks), a news correspondent whom she respects and trusts because of his knowledge, experience, and integrity. Aaron aspires to advance in his career but is held back because he's not as visually attractive as less qualified news employees and he lacks a confident demeaner. Enter Tom Grunick (William Hurt), a good-looking former sportscaster who is hired by the DC area network where Jane and Aaron work. Tom has been hired as a prime time news anchor based on his viewer appeal, not his experience or knowledge. Tom is everything that Jane fears and despises for the future of the broadcast news industry. As profits become more important than integrity, the network places more value on style than actual substance and it seeks to elevate the inexperienced who poll better with viewers. Tom admits that he often doesn't understand the topics he's covering, yet he succeeds because he has Jane and Aaron feeding him information and questions through an earpiece. Eventually the three learn to co-exist, but their relationships are complicated when Aaron admits that he has romantic feelings for Jane, while simultaneously Jane is beginning to have a relationship with Tom. The characters are well defined, and the plot digs deep into that period in young professional's lives when they are out to change the world and spend so much time at work that it muddies their personal lives as well, an experience that most viewers can relate to. This movie came out shortly after the first 24-hour news network (CNN) began airing. Jane's fear of the future of news seems more real today than when the film was first released. We now have several 24-hour channels that label themselves as news, yet their entire broadcast days are filled with nothing but opinionated commentary and there's not a single real journalist in sight. In just the last few weeks we've learned that one of them (Fox) deliberately fed its viewers information it knew to be false, solely to increase ratings by telling much of its audience what they wanted to hear rather than what was true. This is a much more egregious betrayal of journalistic ethics than the staged tears that Tom serves up in the film when interviewing a victim of rape. A tear that would end his complicated relationship with Jane. This film, its creators, and performers are all deserving of the many award nominations they received. It barely seems dated (ok, usage of VHS tapes aside!) and provides an extremely well crafted and satisfying ending.

Intense scenes of television newsrooms are alternated with intense scenes of the romantic lives of the protagonists, making for an intense workplace comedy. I found it unique and interesting and I particularly enjoyed the coda where the main characters meet up a few years after the main action of the film. Also makes good use of the Washington D.C. setting-you really feel like you are in the political capital rubbing shoulders with its denizens.

Ages well even 35 years after release . Amazing performance by Holly Hunter and William Hurt

Half an hour in, you're settled in and thinking that Broadcast News is going to be terribly conventional - a woman finds professional success but cries at her desk in a sense of personal unfulfilment, while being courted by both an ambitious (and ruthless) career man and a clever, emotionally resonant, and frustrated investigative reporter. Stay tuned to find out which passion she will choose to indulge, or if she will throw down her hair and declare herself a strong, independent woman. Fortunately, James L. Brooks manages to surprise with a story that is much more realistic, passionate, checkered, and entertaining. The first aspect that stands out is the dialogue, which feels not only authentic but surprisingly witty, particularly whenever Albert Brooks gets to flex his comedy chops. You get a real sense of the frustration and the hopefulness, nailing home actual character development and a sense of legitimate drama that seemed poised at the outset to be destined for cheap pulp, soap opera-style conflicts. Holly Hunter gives such a good combination of professionalism and personal shortcomings, it's really wonderful to see in a decade that was painfully afraid to depict female characters in anything but positions of firm control, the slightest sign of realistic character design opening up accusations of sexism. More representation is great, but lip service alone would be derogatory towards women in film; it's the complex, human roles that really showed the acceptance of female characters in the medium. The ending might be a bit neat and defrays some of the supposed stakes of the main plot, but it's not like you're not happy seeing the epilogue that Brooks delivers. Probably has to be among my favorite William Hurt performances as well, I'm just so used to seeing him play virtually the same character archetype of a dry, often emotionally pained 30-something (Accidental Tourist, The Big Chill, even Kiss of the Spider Woman) that seeing some passion and happiness in one of his roles is a welcome change. (3.5/5)

1001 movies to see before you die. My old roommates' recommended. It was an entertaining and original comedy that does Albert Brooks justice. Although Holly Hunter was annoying and Hurt weak at times, this movie was well written and entertaining. Saw it on HBO.

I think it's trying to make some kind of point but it's been lost to time.

Broadcast New is, for the most part, a pretty entertaining look at the day-to-day, behind-the-scenes look at the television news industry. Sure, it at times feels like sitcom material and sure, the music score is a bit annoying at times and totally unnecessary at other times and sure, it's probably much longer than it really needs to be, but the three central characters are all interesting and well-developed and the acting from the three leads (William Hurt, Holly Hunter, Albert Brooks) is stellar. The combination of drama, romance, and comedy keeps things light and the scene of Albert Brooks as the fill-in anchorman is absolutely classic.

Do you ever find yourself hemming and hawing to yourself like, "Network" or "Broadcast News"? Which one did you revisit to study the media exploiting itself? Was it "Network" spitting from its ON monitor "TURN IT OFF!"? I've seen "Network" enough and it's permanently ON, so the resolution didn't work. Neither did the endcap for this film which seemed like an awkward footnote that we didn't need, and could've been played in the background as the credits rolled, but overall this is a poignant take on what it means to be a journalist in the 80s. Holly Hunter is great in this because she's just like Henry Rollins. Whenever someone meets Rollins they are shocked by how tiny he is because he's got a huge persona. The same goes for Hunter. She is a tiny little thing with one heck of a bang that bowls over the other actors around her. Anyone who remembers this film is going to remember Holly Hunter crying, which is her character's ritual for cleansing the intensity she goes through minute to minute. No one on screen is as tightly wound as her character, which means when she lets her guard down, it really comes down. You also see more behind the curtain of Oz in this than you do in "Network", as you see Brooks' character is smart and newsworthy, but he can't keep his jacket straight and sweats like a fraudulent Nixon on camera. William Hurt as his JFK-like nemesis understands his beauty almost too well, and struggles with the newsworthy when we find out he fake cried because he knows his fanbase responds to emotional reporting. "Network" really builds rage for the industry of Oz, while this one pulls back the curtain in the most entertaining ways, showing the humans behind the media zoo.

somewhat self-important but I enjoyed it

The three leads, Hunter, Hurt, and Brooks were expertly cast and are what drive this film forward but it is the infectious personality of Holly Hunter's character that I will most remember as I found her performance quite captivating. Among the conflicts faced by Hunter's character both personally and professionally it was her resistance to the newer and more emotionally manipulative form of "news" stories in favor of the more traditional fact based news reporting that I found most interesting and quite prescient for 1987. Those who wonder how "news" got to where it is today can (aside from looking in a mirror) see, with a much wider perspective, this evolution and change in public perception with regard to "news" when experiencing other forms of media from the past.

Great performance by Holly Hunter and a pretty good screenplay

Great story, and wonderful performances. I just saw it for the first time in 2020, and loved it.