'Doubt' an indictment of those who block the truth

<b>Mini-review: 'Merchants of Doubt'</b>

The documentary "Merchants of Doubt" should be required viewing for anyone involved in journalism, PR and communications.

Smart, well-researched and shocking in its revelations, "Merchants of Doubt" tacitly indicts the mainstream media for failing to execute its journalistic due diligence by properly vetting "experts" they interview on important topics, such as health and environment.

The cornerstone of this doc is a 1960s secret dossier outlining how the tobacco industry could effectively block regulations and continue to financially thrive for decades despite hard scientific information that smoking causes severe health issues and even death.

How did the tobacco industry pull this off? By implementing an attack against scientific evidence, using fake or paid experts, confusion and misdirection to convince the public that tobacco products are safe, or at least not as dangerous as the scientific experts say.

Director Robert Kenner, basing his doc on a 2010 book written by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway, shows how other industries have adopted the tobacco industry playbook to confuse and obfuscate scientific conclusions about oil spills, climate change and greenhouse gasses, all in an orchestrated attempt to keep the profitable status quo for businesses.

"Merchants of Doubt" will undoubtedly fan angry fires of controversy, as did Kenner's 2009 revelatory doc about the quality of what we eat, "Food, Inc."

Kenner's movie argues that truth should trump politics in matters of health, safety and environment.

Yet, it suggests the American public buys into the rhetoric of confusion because its uncritical, slumbering news media give equal weight to both scientists and industry shills hired not to correct facts or find truth, but merely to cast doubt on any conclusions that threaten corporate interests.

"Merchants of Doubt" opens with magician Jamy Ian Swiss performing card tricks to entertain us while showing how easily we can be duped with misdirection and showmanship.

Kenner uses these tricks as a narrative motif, a fundamental mistake in my mind. Equating misinformation that can hurt or kill with harmless magic acts diminishes the importance and severity of this journalistic crisis.

Remember the slogan for the TV series "The X-Files" - the truth is out there? Can you prove that? There's no consensus on it. How do we know the truth isn't just the babbling of a nut job?

See how it works? When shills employ the Big Tobacco game plan, even agents Scully and Mulder wouldn't know the truth if it beamed into their FBI offices.

<b>"Merchants of Doubt" opens at the River East 21 and Century Centre in Chicago. Rated PG-13 for language. 96 minutes. ★ ★ ★ ½</b>