>Outfoxed< shows how FoX News Channel has developed a format intended more to manipulate the thoughts of viewers than to inform. FoX, which claims to be "Fair and Balanced" is the antithesis of fairness and balance, as the documentary shows.
The creators of >Outfoxed< give credit to FoX News for slick innovations in television journalism, including the establishment of a corporate identity (one could never confuse FoX News with some other form of TV journalism), musical motifs that set the tone, and such a device as the "FoX News Alert" that draws attention to a breaking story. But they also expose the manipulativeness of FoX News for misusing the News Alert for titillating items.
The documentary shows how those who go along with FoX News' editorial opinions get the royal treatment, yet those who run afoul of it get cut down. Bill O'Reilly is shown telling his interviewees to "Shut up!" when they go 'too far' in contradicting him and, in one case, the use of odd camera angles to make someone who disagrees with him (a son of a 9/11 victim refusing to go along with the aggressive foreign policy of the Bush Administration) look like a terrorist, bum, or monster. It also shows how FoX debased reporting at formerly-independent TV stations such as WTTG (Channel 5 in Washington DC) as Murdoch took them over.
The great fault of FoX News is that although it consumes much time of a viewer it offers little news -- but much scripted analysis intended more to convince than to inform. >Outfoxed< gets FoX... right.
The creators of >Outfoxed< give credit to FoX News for slick innovations in television journalism, including the establishment of a corporate identity (one could never confuse FoX News with some other form of TV journalism), musical motifs that set the tone, and such a device as the "FoX News Alert" that draws attention to a breaking story. But they also expose the manipulativeness of FoX News for misusing the News Alert for titillating items.
The documentary shows how those who go along with FoX News' editorial opinions get the royal treatment, yet those who run afoul of it get cut down. Bill O'Reilly is shown telling his interviewees to "Shut up!" when they go 'too far' in contradicting him and, in one case, the use of odd camera angles to make someone who disagrees with him (a son of a 9/11 victim refusing to go along with the aggressive foreign policy of the Bush Administration) look like a terrorist, bum, or monster. It also shows how FoX debased reporting at formerly-independent TV stations such as WTTG (Channel 5 in Washington DC) as Murdoch took them over.
The great fault of FoX News is that although it consumes much time of a viewer it offers little news -- but much scripted analysis intended more to convince than to inform. >Outfoxed< gets FoX... right.