The film deserves a 1 for awful just because of the amateurish use of propaganda. That is to say, other producers are much better at crafting propaganda to convince the gullible without being quite so obvious.The main thing wrong here, aside from the typical methods of taking quotes out of context, exaggeration and failing to compare any supposed wrongs committed by Fox News to other news networks, is the omission of any opposing voice whatsoever.If you are going to deceive viewers effectively, much like ABC, NBC and CBS do every day of the year on their morning and evening news programs, the secret to winning over people at least half-aware is to allow somebody to disagree with the main theme. The smart producers then or beforehand destroy the credibility of that voice. Yet by allowing it on-screen, many in the audience are convinced that it must indeed be a fair treatment and therefore a credible work.Still, liberal audiences being who they are, deeply suffering from years of misinformation, taught as they have been to despise and distrust Fox News and talk radio (the only places to get any truth in this age of deceit), the documentary worked for millions of them. One could hear them walking around as if this one piece or the follow-up book finally provided the Holy Grail, the element ready to silence those rascally conservatives robotically following Fox and Rush.Fox News and talk radio (you could add in Christian radio here also) must be taken down because they represent the lone voices against the worldview of liberalism. Tyrants have always sought to silence opposition. In an age of ostensible freedom of speech, however, the unexpected storm of truth emanating from conservative outlets had to be permitted. Well, Democrats are trying vigorously to get talk radio shut down by re-introducing the "Fairness Doctrine." But with Fox, their reaction has been to teach America that no one should trust those people over there on that cable channel.So here's a summary of how we got here. The liberals owned all media for years and years. From that perch, they limited conservatives to one-fourth of the presence on any show (like "This Week with David Brinkley," like "The View" even today), though generally no presence at all, like the evening news and morning programs.President Reagan shot down the Fairness Doctrine. That opened the door for the voices that ordinary patriots actually wanted to hear, those who had resisted the teaching being put out. Limbaugh rocketed to popularity. The media tried ignoring him at first, as they do most opponents. Failing the first measure, they launched into attack mode. Pat Buchanan came in for the same treatment. Destroy this man before he actually wins the nomination. Along came Fox News. All of the dogs were released. This documentary is one of the (attack) dogs.In the opening segment, viewers are supposed to be shocked and frightened upon learning how many media operations are owned by Rupert Murdoch (who owns Fox News). I have personally heard the gasps from teenagers being fed this propaganda in college. What is left out (sadly, even by professors much of the time) is that all of the large media companies are parts of much larger conglomerates. They must acquire more in order to consolidate and compete. CBS is owned by Viacom, which also owns MTV, Nickelodeon, VH1, Paramount Pictures, Infinity Broadcasting, UPN, TNN, CMT, Showtime, Blockbuster, and Simon & Schuster (the book publisher). Do we see documentaries being produced and shown in universities frightening students about Viacom? If knowing how 60 Minutes (a CBS program) went after Bush for eight straight years while laying off most Democrats, how CBS did likewise (think of how Dan Rather covered up the Gary Condit episode), it is probable that fair minded observers would grow plenty frightened of Viacom. But what they get are frightful accounts of Fox News.Why I gave "Outfoxed - Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism" a 3 is due to its level of fairly decent cinematic techniques (transitions, graphics, camera angles and voice-overs), hardly the best out there, yet reaching into the bottom tier of professional quality. If wanting to view another huge propaganda film, though one with amazing production quality, try Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 or Al Gore's almost beautiful (though completely untruthful) An Inconvenient Truth.By the way, I am currently reviewing Outfoxed for a research paper on propaganda in a college documentary class.

For anyone who has cable, and is therefore exposed to the Fox network, there really is no need to view this movie. Anything that you may want to know about Fox can be learned by watching any of the shows on this channel for a week."Outfoxed" is a well made documentary that offers an alternative perspective to how Rupert Murdoch and the rest of "the boys" at Fox view the media and it's role. Journalists expect a news network to be objective, and report on what's happening without providing a slanted view of the news. Rupert Murdoch believes that the media should act as advocate for a cause, or idea, or a man (in this case George Bush).I'm willing to bet that anyone who sees this film will not "convert to the other side". I don't think that there are going to be too many people who see this film, who will not already have decided whether or not they agree that Fox is "Fair and Balanced"But despite the well intentions of the film makers, there is ultimately nothing new that is offered as fresh perspective, in this film. 6 out of 10

Well, this is outright propaganda aimed at Fox News. It doesn't pretend to be anything else, and therein lies its superiority to Fox News as reportage and as a source of opinion.I've rarely watched Fox News and so can't comment in much detail on the target of this documentary. But from what I've seen, both on the Fox News Channel and in this film, I find it hard to argue against the proposition that Fox is corrupting our view of the universe.The received wisdom has always been that the media shape our opinions but that's never satisfied me because I can't see it as the entire explanation. Rather, I've always thought of the way we construct reality as a joint function of our news sources and the prejudices that draw us to one source rather than another. What passes for reality is in the interaction between ourselves and the information source. I think this is known as intentionality in philosophy, but it doesn't matter.I'm willing to make a major exception in the case of Fox News. As a "fair and balanced" source of information, it not only sucks in itself but it practically rots the mind of its viewers. Authoritarians and neoconservatives may be drawn to Fox like a moth to a flame, but, like the moth, they will find themselves and their brains fried to a crisp by continued viewing."Outfoxed" gives us a shallow history of how Fox News changed, rather abruptly, from a standard news channel to the number one promoter of the Republican Party that it is today. Mostly we see and hear talking heads, most of them former employees of Fox -- news producers, commentators, reporters -- some of them anonymous.Fox, and the administration whose semi-official spokesman it is, would have a ready reply. Disgruntled former employees, trying to sell books or gain their fifteen minutes of fame or taking revenge on an organization that had good reason to let them go.But the evidence presented in the film is so clear that it's hard to deny. One disgruntled employee, maybe, but a whole slew of them constitutes a pattern. And there are direct quotes from talking points (or "edicts" as one critic calls them) that come down daily from on high, instructing news writers in which events to harp on -- and how to harp on them.And yet, for all that, one has to admire Fox News in certain ways. It was really sui generis. An almost perfect blend of eye-catching graphics, pungent opinion pieces, news presentations that seamlessly blend propaganda with reportage, and a general dumbing down of issues so that the least inquisitive mind can grasp them in all their simplicity. There has never BEEN anything like Fox News, at least not in this country. There have been equivalents in the USSR and other countries, but not here.Greenwald isn't Michael Moore. He's not as reckless and not as entertaining. The film is about the subject, not about its maker. And it's deadly serious, without stunts or jokes, except insofar as the snippets of commentary from Fox news readers are jokes in themselves.There is almost a kind of Gresham's law at work in the news industry, in which dumb news drives out more demanding analysis and understanding. If we hear several times a day that Kerry "flip flops", we know all we need to know about the candidate. He's a flip flopper. We don't need to know the context. We don't even have to know what he's flip flopped on or why. It's enough that we know he's indecisive and deceitful. Who wouldn't buy into a message like that? It goes down like a draught of Pepto-Bismol.The film ends on a kind of up-beat note. We can put an end to this desecration of a respected profession by becoming activists. But can we? Do we really want to? An Ipsos Poll two years ago showed that the vast majority of Fox Viewers, more than 70 percent, still believed that Saddam had close ties with al Qa'eda. (Compared to about 5 percent of PBS/NPR viewers.) A majority also thought that Saddam had WMDs at the time of the invasion. The opportunity to live in such a world of Biblical good and evil, where our every action is the right one, is seductive. I don't know if we can break Murdoch's increasing monopoly of the news media -- short of electing another trust buster like Teddy Roosevelt. (He was a Republican too.)

I had heard a lot about Fox News Channel but had never actually seen it. Outfoxed has given me the opportunity to see the "worst of" the channel with its investigation into what exactly is going on there. Everything about the existence of a Fox News Channel mystifies me (and the reported effects it has had on other U.S. news channels). Perhaps this goes back to my incomprehension of what forms the basis of the right-wing. It happens that Rupert Murdoch is an ardent fan of the Republican Party.The existence of this kind of abundant free airtime for the U.S. government doesn't appear caused any significant changes at first glance as there's always more than one choice for viewers, whereas the state-controlled USSR television stations Fox News Channel is sometimes compared to was the only thing available at the time for Russians. On closer inspection Fox News Channel has potentially determined the outcome of an election, "sold" a war and introduced a process of change in the American media. Rival news networks strangely view it in a favourable light and attempt to "outfox Fox" by giving preference to the right-wing viewpoint. "Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism" is an appropriate subtitle as Murdoch is primarily a businessman and Republican Party "activist". Murdoch began his working life running an Adelaide newspaper at the age of 22; he has always been a manager of media so it's not surprising he has no allegiance to the profession of journalism.Fox News Channel, the Republican Party and the entire right wing of America are fascinating and presumably after their rise and rise, there will be a fall and people will rightly look upon the 00's as a strange time.