Blog 6: Hero Analysis

The media manipulate our emotions through a variety of ways. Specifically, in the movie “Hero”, there is the scene in which Gale Gayley puts together a piece on “The Angel of Flight 104”. As Gale was laying down in her hospital bed, she realized that there was someone who anonymously saved the lives of fifty-four people. She felt this was a fantastic story, being a high-profile news reporter. Gale went out and interviewed all the survivors of the plane crash who had an encounter with the anonymous man. The only evidence they have of this “angel” is a shadow on a frame on some footage the cameraman was shooting. The footage is then edited with the most heartfelt moments of the interviews, being sure to include each injury on the survivors. There is also some music playing lightly in the background, and some moving images dancing across the screen. 

If you notice today, this marketing technique is not uncommon. News stations do things like this more often than not. In the movie, Gale Gayley strategically puts together a specific formula of images and audio to make her viewers fall in love with a mere shadow. Even before any of the viewers have a materialized image of this hero in their minds, the story brings tears to their eyes. Though Gale has an emotional attachment to the hero, there is still a reason as to why the News station even broadcasts the story, for ratings.  After John Bubber deceitfully comes forward as the man who saved the fifty-four people from a plane that was eventually going to explode, he becomes not only a hero to the survivors, but to everyone who has access to a television or a newspaper. Everyone idolizes this man, who as we know as an audience to the movie, is not the real hero. In this aspect of the movie, the media also indirectly manipulate these people into giving the wrong man credit for a selfless act. 

In one scene of the movie, there are two men who obviously work for the news station. They make it evident that they only care about the ratings that John Bubber is bringing to the News Station. The media trick us into thinking that they sincerely care about its viewers and about a specific subject, when really, their intentions and hard work all lie within the hunger for higher ratings. This is made clear during the scene in which John Bubber is going to jump off of a building, and the possibility that John Bubber may not be the “hero” is presented to them. They basically say that they put everything into John Bubber, and he brings ratings.