Just shows..
how the media can control and manipulate. Terrible.
shareI fear we can't blame it on the media (at least not as it's currently constituted).
First, our society requires the news media to make money by selling news. The book from which this film is adapted goes to great lengths to present "just the facts" via a series of rather dry police reports. The book wound up illustrating the news media's difficulty by being portrayed as "overly dry" by some reviewers. It's clearly not "interesting" enough to sell lots of copies to the general public. As news media becomes "more responsible" the news media' profitability suffers -- no easy answers here.
And second, the news media in this film could only do what it did because it operated in a wider public attitude of "personal safety at all costs". As illustrated by this film, although much police activity was silly and although much government behavior was power-driven, the general public accepted and encouraged these things. If the public attitude had been different, both news media and government behavior would have also been different.
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"the general public accepted and encouraged these things. If the public attitude had been different, both news media and government behavior would have also been different."
That's the big flaw of both the novel and the movie, the idea that the public has any say in the matter. The media does not give us what we want, in fact they don't even listen to us. They're political mouthpieces giving their financiers exactly what they want.