Radio Wars

What begins as a rich history of corporate manipulation and government corruption during the early years of radio turns into a long, numbing slog through the travails of satellite radio pioneer Sirius in filmmaker Sandra Mohr's exhausting documentary Radio Wars. The first third of the film focuses on such shameful chapters in American media as the denial of patents to radio's real inventor, Nikola Tesla, who envisioned his creation as a free gift to the world. Viewers also see how established media forms—always fearful of disruptive new types of communication—tried to block radio's progress in its infancy, leading to the creation of networks such as NBC and CBS, which developed in-house content. Radio itself, in the AM spectrum, tried to impede the development of the FM bandwidth, followed by major media companies trying to make life difficult for satellite radio and its model of subscription-based, censorship-free broadcasts. Radio Wars delves into the nitty-gritty of a dirty fight to undercut Sirius's stock and wrap the company up in regulations, but Sirius—which received a major boost from hiring Howard Stern and merging with rival XM—has prevailed. Radio buffs may appreciate the account of Sirius's evolution, but general documentary fans may find the onslaught of details overwhelming. Optional. Aud: C, P. (T. Keogh)