Film Analysis Of The Film: Fallacious Fracking

Fallacious Fracking Stretching the truth only delivers a rise of uncertainty from the audience. The topic of fracking has brought an incessant amount of controversy among American citizens. What these citizens fail to realize is the tone and the use of an emotional strategy utilized to drive the audience in a position of belief. Josh Fox, the founder of International WOW Company, directed the movie Gasland to show the adverse effects of hydraulic fracturing (fracking) on people, animals, and the environment (Gale…, 2011). Gasland is filmed as if an ordinary, banjo-playing citizen was recording these clips on his phone. The point of his actions is to show how he is relatable to the general public, but still capable of joining the fight

Throughout the entire movie, Josh Fox uses a dreary, monotone dialect to sway the audience towards how fracking causes damage on earth. “Gasland focuses on natural gas and questions the industry 's portrayal of this fuel as clean energy” (‘Gasland’ Takes…, 2011, para.2). The tone of the film is used as a tactic to lure the people living near the drilling site into rebelling against fracking. Fox’s documentary also shows pathos through the health of life on the areas of drilling sites, “…it reminded me of Upton Sinclair 's classic The Jungle; a world where profits rule and the bodies, minds, and well-being of humans are resigned to the meat grinder of bourgeois history” (Fox, 2011). With the ill life of animals and humans, he easily compares this situation to The Jungle, capturing the attention of melancholic viewers. In addition, buzz words were used in the film to incite sorrow and distress among residents. In Ira Flatow’s interview with Josh Fox, Flatow states, “His plan was to chat with the locals about how the extraction operation was affecting them, but what they had to say was more shocking than he had ever expected” (Thompson, 2013, para.4). Words like shocking are used to promote discontinuation for fracking. Even with the use of pathos, the director strives to gain more viewers with its stretched truths through

Ad hominem was repeatedly employed to attack the gas companies rather than for the main purpose of fracking. Recalling the interview with Fox, Ira Flatow asks Fox about the incident of lighting faucets on fire, “He 's talking about your flaming faucet and Renee McClure in Colorado, that this was investigated and was a local pocket of gas” (New Film…, 2010, para. 4). In other words, the lighting of gas from faucets was actually unrelated to the fracking chemicals or the issue itself. Similarly, the use of snow job by Fox shows the audience that he only attacks one side of the case on fracking rather than providing a second point of view. “…our water wasn 't flammable before. They came and did a frack job, all of a sudden, our water is flammable. And what we 're asking for are detailed investigations” (‘Gasland’ Takes…, 2011, para. 2). Josh Fox is only interested in why the gas company is releasing chemicals into the faucets. He does not take the time to see the true origin of the chemicals. Without further search of more evidence, Gasland lacks the research needed to make his argument