A dramatic illustration of the Manufacturing of Consent

Rating: 8/10 (6 November 1999)

This is one of the finest films I've ever seen, and one of the most important of the year. It illustrates the cold bloodedly greedy ruthlessness of the tobacco industry and the dire implications of big media taking money as a priority over the truth.
It's almost surreal, but all too creditble, to see a big corporation act like a thug, openly threatening people, using their own families as de facto hostages to get their silence. However, that didn't surprise me considering I have read about these hoodlums' antics in at least one book called "Merchants of Death" which also illustrated the underhanded tactics of these jokers. Also see them threatening to sue CBS for broadcasting the truth and the truth itself only makes the case worse is a bizarre echo of the famous Peter Zenger case. In the 17th century American colonies in which truth for a supposed libel printed by a newspaper publisher was not considered a defense back then and it took a brilliant lawyer representing Zenger to change that. There are many things we have to deal with in our times, but refighting the Zenger case in the civil law sphere should not be one of them.
However, what was even more ominous was the waffling of CBS News as they buckle to corporate pressure. What you see in this film illustrate the very same tactics that major media critics like Noam Chomsky have noted that big media is prone to do. For instance, the censoring of Mike Wallace's interview about being censored was excused on the basis on time constraints. This is what Chomsky has noted as the tactic of "concision" where time constraints are use to limit debate and discussion to make you have to speak only pat & bland statements because to say something really unexpected and new would simply too much time to explain between commercials. In short, this film is an excellent companion to the film Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media (1992).
This film is a real eye opener and an absolute must to anyone who wants to know was both big business and big media are capable of doing.