Fahrenheit 9/11

[Jeremy Blackman]

Dude, you need to chill the fuck out.

Any anger you're sensing is either imagined or not directed at you. I think this whole thing is fascinating, and I'm more sorting things out than arguing with you specifically. Just because I wrote a lot doesn't mean I'm mad at you. I've been civil and I haven't personally attacked you, so I'm not sure where your image of me is coming from.

As I said, I agree with the film's politics.

That wasn't even relevant to our debate, though (which was completely about technique and the definition of legitimate political filmmaking), and doesn't make me less enthusiastic to have a good discussion.

[mutinyco]

Any anger you're sensing is either imagined or not directed at you. I think this whole thing is fascinating, and I'm more sorting things out than arguing with you specifically. I've been civil and I haven't personally attacked you, so I'm not sure where your image of me is coming from.

How 'bout the fact that you keep quoting me, then going on at length to refute the quotes...

[Jeremy Blackman]

How 'bout the fact that you keep quoting me, then going on at length to refute the quotes...

That's just what I do.  

[mutinyco]

Well then, good sir, in the morning I shall be sober, but you...  8)

[ono]

Michael Moore was on Conan O'Brien earlier tonight.  So you can check it out on the rerun tomorrow on Comedy Central or next week.

[matt35mm]

Or if you live on the West Coast like me, this can serve as a reminder to tune in tonight if you wanna.

[Ghostboy]

I just got back from it, and as I predicted, it was brilliant, enraging, manipulative, etc. I loved it, and will be writing a full review discussing my minor problems with it later.

It was preaching to the choir in my case, of course, and that is my one fear -- the theater was sold out, had been sold out since early in the afternoon, and the movie was frequently met with rapturous applause from the entire theater, and that made it a great experience; but I hope other people are going to see it. Those on the opposite side of the fence will likely dismiss it, but I hope people on the middleground turn out, because they're the ones that I think it'll have the greatest effect on.

[pete]

I heard only about 1% of the registered voters this year are on the middle ground; the rest of them have "already decided".  Is this true?  how can this be?

[Ghostboy]

Well, I know I've certainly decided, and so have all my friends and relatives (although I still have hope that I can get my mom to change her mind).

Where this movie stands to have the biggest effect is with the unregistered voters, or those who may be registered but are too apathetic to care.

[Ravi]

Much of the audience will be people who already know of the facts in the film or agree with the film's politics even if they don't, but plenty of people will be interested enough in this that they will see it even if they are not very politically aware.

It is good to catch people unaware.  On the news the best we get are prepackaged answers from questions approved in advance or the standard BS.

[adolfwolfli]

It is true, and wholly expected that the bulk of the opening-weekend crowds are going to be Moore's followers, but there are many promising emails being posted on Moore's site which mention "swing" voters and Republican-types walking out of the theater convinced...

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/breakingnews/index.php?id=32

And also, what you have to realize is that one of the big problems with the left is its disorganization and lack of cohesion.  I think, if anything, the film is becoming a sort of rallying cry - a common ground for a lot of different groups, something to get behind and use as a way to get voters registered, etc.

My personal review is posted at :

http://www.splendidstuff.com/

[mutinyco]

It was preaching to the choir in my case, of course, and that is my one fear -- the theater was sold out, had been sold out since early in the afternoon, and the movie was frequently met with rapturous applause from the entire theater, and that made it a great experience; but I hope other people are going to see it. Those on the opposite side of the fence will likely dismiss it, but I hope people on the middleground turn out, because they're the ones that I think it'll have the greatest effect on.

If it makes close to $30 million this weekend, which seems likely, this ISN'T just the choir. Not with those numbers. That would be like saying the opening weekend for The Passion was just Christians. By Sunday afternoon it will have already surpassed BFC, the highest grossing doc.

[Ghostboy]

Here's my full review:

In my case, and in the case of many of the people who will be turning out opening weekend in droves to support it, Fahrenheit 9/11 is preaching to choir. George W. Bush and his adminstration are toxic, and their policies are uprooting the foundations of our country: this is something I believe, a position I endorse, and I think Moore has made a strong and important film that supports it. I didn't need this film to validate my opinions on these matters, but there's no doubt that it strengthened them. As someone who, over the course of this administration, has gone from apathatic to cautiously critical to fully outraged, I hope this film succeeds and changes the minds that need to be changed. As a critic, I'll review it as a film, and consider its faults, but that it has faults should be no deterent; this film needs to be seen.

The best thing Moore has going for him here, aside from winning the Palm d'Or at Cannes and gaining endless free publicity from the Disney/Miramax debacle and the conservatives who seek to suppress him, is that he's wearing his intentions on his sleeve; he made this film to get Bush out of office. It's full of propaganda, as it's been accused of being, but the fact that Moore admits as much makes a big difference; his agenda is overt, not subversive, and it's important to keep that in mind when watching the film. He brilliantly presents a portrait of a leader who practically defines the term ineffective; is it accurate? I personally think so, but I was also aware that I was being ever so slightly coerced towards an opinion that I had already formed. When Bush spends those seven indecisive minutes in the classroom on September 11, Moore's narration suggest what he might be thinking, just in case we have any doubts. Certainly, it's not hard at all to string together clips of Dubya making grammatical goofs, acting like a good old boy, being indecisive; he's an endlessly easy target.

Where Moore hits his goldmine, where he goes past propaganda, is with his illustrations of the Bush family's connections to the Bin Ladin family, and the corporate ties his administration his to Saudi Arabia. It's material you may or may not already know; regardless, seeing it here, with concrete video footage, is rather sobering. Knowing that an army of fact checkers and lawyers have pored over every bit of the footage in the film to ascertain its accuracy is nice to know, but even if they hadn't, it'd be hard to look at this footage and explain it otherwise.

These connections take up the first half of the film and set up the second half, which is more of a traditional anti-war film. We see Bush calling himself a "war president," talking about how his agenda is all about war, and then he dissapears for long periods of time. The Moore shows us the kind of footage Network Telivision won't; mutilated bodies, dead children, grieving parents, callous soldiers listening to heavy metal as they roll into battle, and, more effectively, disillusioned soldiers disgusted with the situation they've found themselves in. Equally shocking, I found, was the actual footage of the bombing, portions of which we have seen on TV -- shocking, because the footage broadcast was so severely truncated that it would be almost impossible to determine the amount of damage being done. I was reminded of how, in the old days of censorship codes, a filmmaker couldn't show the effects of a gunshot in the same shot as the gunshot itself; a similar principal seems to be in application with our media.

Through all this, we remember what we've seen in the first half of the film. The connections are clear; this war in Iraq seems to be little more than a business strategy. War supporters will point out that no mention is made of the good the war has done; to which one might ask them what good they're speaking of. The removal of Saddam is, of course, some sort of questionable accomplishment, and Moore makes one error that I think might harm his case; he shows us an pre-war Iraq that is a happy and cheerful place. The country is tantamount to some extreme level of hell now -- but it wasn't a picnic before we were there, either.

When he won the Palm d'Or, Moore was told by jury president Quentin Tarantino that he was being awarded for his filmmaking, not his politics. Indeed, the film is masterful assembly of found footage and interviews; it is never exploitative, especially in the actual coverage of the events of Septemebr 11th. Moore is famous for his humor, but it's largely subdued this time around, appropriately so. There are a few segments, one in which he inserts the faces of Bush's administration into an episode of Gunsmoke and another where he provides a hilarious role call of the Coalition Of The Willing, that might have been better left on the cutting room floor, because they're too funny, and in the case of the former have no point but to amuse. On the other hand, the scenes in which he tries to enlist the children of Congressmen or reads the Patriot Act over an ice cream truck's loudspeaker -- classic Michael Moore, as they might be called -- are not as outrageous as you might think. Like his trip to K-Mart world headquarters in Bowling For Columbine, there's nothing sardonic about them; at least in that case, he accomplished something, but his stunts here have an urgency and hopelessness to them; so much more is at stake, and the way the congressmen go out of their way to avoid him is sobering.

I have to admit that after the film was over, I felt vaguely disappointed; I wanted it to go further. But then, after thinking about it, I wondered how much further could it have gone? How many more concrete indictments could be made against our president? I think my disappointment lies with me, and that I went into this film hoping that it would contain things that would make everyone who supports Bush have second thoughts, that it would pull the wool from their eyes; of course, the problem is that his die-hard supporters have no wool in their eyes, and all those concrete accusations are things they support. The film will not sway them, because they can't be swayed. They want our country to go the way it's going; yes, war is bad, and all the terrible things Moore shows are shocking, but that's to be expected.

But if it's true that a huge number of registered voters are apathetic, and that an even greater number of American citizens are not registered at all (just like I was at the last election), then I think this film will have the intended affect; it's a highly effective cure for apathy. People who support Moore's cause will see this film for that reason; people who are set in their opposition will see it to see just what they're up against; but everyone else, who hasn't made up their mind, are the ones who need to see it the most. I honestly hope they aren't swayed by the propaganda, and that they make up their own minds; I also believe that there's more than enough factual material to convince any reasonable person that Bush needs to go.

We'll see in a few months, I suppose; but then, of course, there remains that troubling topic that Moore touches on very effetively at the beginning of the film. If Bush did in fact steal the presidency in 2000, what will stop him from doing it again? I shudder to think.

[Pedro]

you spelled fahrenheit wrong

[Ghostboy]

Yes, you see, I was testing you.