Network

With Network, Sidney Lumet and Paddy Chayefsky prefigured the rise of Fox News, Mail Online, Trumpian populism and the dangerous distortion of truth that inevitably results from the insidious convergence of reality TV and politics. Chayefsky presented a media dystopia that wasn’t far removed from reality in 1976, nor is it today, 45 years later. Revealing, visceral and subversive with razor-sharp direction and a bunch of standout performances to boot, it’s aged like a rare wine.