Montana Meth Advertisement Analysis

Anti-drug public service announcements have used many different methods of achieving their goal. Many of these ads are intended to make people scared of drugs, however, I believe no PSAs have been as scary as the ads from the Montana Meth Project. The Montana Meth Project fights against meth use in the state of Montana. They have made many ads intended to educate and dissuade teens and young adults thinking about using meth. One such commercial, entitled Jessica, features multiple settings with a voiceover telling a story of a girl and her experiences in each place. Starting with a high school football stadium detailing how the protagonist used to be a cheerleader then leading the viewer down her dark path of meth addiction in various dark …show more content…
The middle part of this ad when the narrator is describing the main character’s descent into meth addiction and the camera cuts to many different scenes very fast. First it cuts to a close-up of an eye with fast moving graphics around the eye then it cuts abruptly to water dripping. It continues this fashion of quick cuts between people fighting and close-ups of faces. This segment of the ad is very disorienting. It is hard for the audience to tell exactly what is happening in each scene. It gives an anxious feeling to the viewer because there is a lot of stuff going on at once and it can’t be influenced at all by the viewer. Anxiousness is the intended effect. The Montana Meth Project wants teens or young adults to watch this and feel anxious and worried about meth and what it could do. This confusion or anxiousness, achieved through these quick cuts between scenes, are associated with meth through the story of the ad and make it seem like trying meth will leave things uncertain and seemingly out of your control. This works very well in this ad the message to be afraid comes across …show more content…
The Montana Meth Project accomplished its goal of scaring teenagers about meth. The question about this ad and all of the Montana Meth Project’s ad is whether or not they really keep teenagers from using meth. Is scaring kids the best way to keep them from using drugs? Is it more effective to focus on information and rehabilitation? These are the questions that we need to answer moving forward. This ad is great at scaring kids of meth but maybe it doesn’t solve the root