Visual Literacy-Wag the Dog Movie Reflection

For my Visual Literacy class we were to watch the movie, Wag the Dog. This was going to be the last movie of the semester, and after reading the summary for the movie, I was really excited to watch it. One of my favorite TV shows right now is Scandal and I felt this movie was going to be a similar story line, and I was eager to watch it. I was very impressed with the story, and it might have been my favorite this semester.

Watch the trailer below to see if you would be interested in watching this movie:

If the video does not play: Wag the Dog

I think the director is trying to show how much the media can affect the perception of the American people, just by what the media decides to cover. We were also able to see how twisted the world we live in can be, where it is acceptable in our presidents mind, to cover up his scandal with the idea of a fake war.

Throughout this movie I continually thought how today this movie is even more true, and it was created in 1997. I would say we are now even more affected because of the amount of media coverage and social media available.

Barry Levinson was the director of the movie Wag the Dog. He lived in Washington DC when we was younger, which could have influenced the film and the story he wanted to create about the politics and people he met during this time. 

I believe the people that may be offended by this movie because of the dark humor that runs throughout the movie. Also the people within the government may be offended by the representation that is portrayed throughout the movie.

This movie has added a lot to my visual literacy. I was able to see how a visual, that was not even authentic, could convince people there was a war going on in a different area. I was also able to see how the commercial was put together. It was interesting how they were able to manipulate the video through the different screens and the tools that they used, and I think it would be an interesting job. I also believe the advancements we have made with technology would make it hard to produce a video where people do not hear about it from another source and do not test the authenticity of the video. 

Overall this was a great movie and I encourage you to check it out!

Also, here is a clip of the show Scandal I talked about earlier. If you enjoy Wag the Dog I would encourage you to check this out next. 

If the video does not play: Scandal