Manufacturing Consent

In the film “Manufacturing Consent” I noticed that there were was a lot of meaning in the cuts. After Noam Chompsky said something important or revealed something important about the media, there was a cut to something that was relevant or to an image of propaganda. This is likely because it is a documentary, and not a narrative film. The cuts themselves seemed to be examples of propaganda. They reminded me of Soviet montage editing, which was used as propaganda. In “Manufacturing Consent,” it seemed to be used in an ironic way, a way that was mocking the popular media, but also showing the audience the way the popular media functions. The cuts are evidently used to sway the viewer. The example that was used in the film, the contrast between the coverage of East Timor and Cambodia, used these cuts. The camera at one points cuts to a shot of people literally doctoring an article about Cambodia. It is this use of actually showing the viewer what is happening with evidence, as well as the frequent cuts, that help sway the viewer. It helps us to understand the propaganda model by literally showing how it functions, while also showing the absurdity in popular media propaganda.