Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism (2004)

User Rating:

7.7/10   

Director:

Robert Greenwald

Genre:

Documentary

Plot:

Documentary on reported Conservative bias of the Rupert Murdoch-owned Fox News Channel (FNC), which promotes itself as "Fair and Balanced". Material includes interviews with former FNC employees and the inter-office memos they provided. |

Plot Keywords:

Media Literacy | Secretary Of State | Dick Cheney | TV Network | Expose

Cast

Roger Ailes	...	Himself (archive footage)
Eric Alterman	...	Interviewee
Christiane Amanpour	...	Herself (archive footage)
Harry Belafonte	...	Himself (archive footage)
David Brock	...	Interviewee
Tom Brokaw	...	Himself (archive footage)
George W. Bush	...	Himself (archive footage)
Carl Cameron	...	Himself (archive footage)
George Carlin	...	Himself (archive footage)
Neil Cavuto	...	Himself (archive footage)
Douglas Cheek	...	Narrator
Dick Cheney	...	Himself (archive footage)
Richard Clarke	...	Himself
Jeff Cohen	...	Interviewee
Alan Colmes	...	Himself (archive footage)
Walter Cronkite	...	Himself
Laurie Dhue	...	Herself (archive footage)
Steve Doocy	...	Himself (archive footage)
Susan Estrich	...	Herself (archive footage)
Al Franken	...	Himself (also archive footage)
Newt Gingrich	...	Himself (archive footage)
Jeremy Glick	...	Himself (also archive footage)
Sean Hannity	...	Himself (archive footage)
Brit Hume	...	Himself (archive footage)
Molly Ivins	...	Herself (archive footage)
Peter Jennings	...	Himself (archive footage)
Ted Kennedy	...	Himself (archive footage)
John Kerry	...	Himself (archive footage)
Brian Kilmeade	...	Himself (archive footage)
Mike Malloy	...	Himself (archive footage)
Rupert Murdoch	...	Himself (archive footage)
Bill O'Reilly	...	Himself (archive footage)
Dan Rather	...	Himself (archive footage)
Ronald Reagan	...	Himself (archive footage)
Condoleezza Rice	...	Herself (archive footage)
Geraldo Rivera	...	Himself (archive footage)
Martin Sheen	...	Himself (archive footage)
Shepard Smith	...	Himself (archive footage)
Jon Stewart	...	Himself (archive footage)
Cal Thomas	...	Himself (archive footage)
Greta Van Susteren	...	Herself (archive footage)
Linda Vester	...	Herself (archive footage)
Av Westin	...	Himself

Runtime:

75 min | USA:78 min | Argentina:88 min (Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Certification:

Australia:PG | USA:Unrated | Argentina:Atp

Company:

Carolina Productions

Trivia:

The director, Robert Greenwald, used a clip from Eric Clapton's song "Layla" for the film's closing credits in a rough edit, and then read in a magazine interview that Clapton had a long-standing hatred of Rupert Murdoch. He approached Clapton for permission to use the song in the film, and he granted its use... for free.

Quotes:

Bill O'Reilly: Shut up!

Movie Connections:

References "Fox News" (1987)

Soundtrack:

Layla

May be too esoteric for partisan viewers

Well if you go on the vote history you can tell who is a Fox fan or not -- almost all votes are 10 or 1. My vote was 8 -- the only one. That's what this work deserves because although it is very good it has flaws.

One problem with this movie is that it is based on the ringing message (paraphrased): For democracy to work you have to have a media that does its job based on journalistic principles and ethics.

Thing is, fans of Fox News could not care less about any of that. They want "their side" to win win win and to them Fox News is the ONLY outlet that made it possible to hear the "truth" over the tyranny of the "liberal media." They also what professional-wrestling style drama where the bad guy (Kerry, Kennedy, Clinton etc) is built up into some sort of super-monster (that is also cowardly and cheats all the time) which makes the victory all that much more sweeter.

So Fox delivers. Outfoxed shows how it works -- but the story is just as much "what went RIGHT at Fox News" as opposed to "what went WRONG with TV journalism." It is very satisfying to see documented what many of us have already known -- how Republican/White House talking points become injected into the zeitgeist with almost no resistance. From Fox to CNN to MSNBC, then from there into talk radio and mainstream media. When you hear a keyword like "flip flopper" repeated by a dozen different anchors/pundits in 1-second shots strung together it is really impressive.

Outfoxed is part of the backlash to Fox News and right-wing dominance of media. It will be interesting to see how far right-wingers will go to "debunk" this "propaganda." In any case it should be required viewing for all media consumers and most particularly all journalism and political science students. We'd be better off for it.