I finally saw Fahrenheit 9/11 yesterday. I'd been putting it off because I figured, hey, I'm a pretty informed dude, and I tend to agree with what Michael Moore says even if I don't always like how he says it--the movie won't have anything new to tell me, so I'll take my time.
I saw Control Room first, for example--a documentary about al-Jazeera during the invasion of Iraq. It's terribly informative about the process of selling the news during wartime and it focuses on the people behind al-Jazeera as well as the controversy that surrounds them. They have to be doing something right when both Donald Rumsfeld and Iraq's former Minister of Information accuse them of spreading lies and propaganda.
But anyway--Michael Moore. With Bowling for Columbine, I thought he was trying a little too hard in some scenes, like when he leaves the picture of the little girl outside Charleton Heston's mansion. That struck as being for the camera, not a documentation of what really happened. But with 9/11, there is not a single thing I can think of that was trying too hard. Maybe he realized he didn't need to--I don't know. But the movie really punched me in the gut. The stuff with Gore and the 2000 election at the beginning was a great way to start, because that still smarts for me, especially with how things have turned out. I like Gore a lot and I'd vote for him all over again.
The sequence on the attacks made me teary-eyed, as did the interview with the mother from Flint. The parts on military recruitment made me mad, and so did seeing Bush in that classroom trying to pretend like nothing was happening on the morning of the 11th. The movie has its own point of view, but Moore lets the facts tell the story more than he has in the past.
There is one Michael Moore kind of stunt in the film, and it feels pretty out of place. But aside from that, it makes for a powerful film and I'm glad it was made. I'm glad it was distributed and I hope lots and lots of people see it before the election in November.
On an unrelated note, I'm also glad that Barack Obama will be delivering the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in Boston. And I hope someone like Ditka runs against him, so Obama can stomp him. I'm not wildly enthusiastic about Kerry like I would have been about DEAN, but I am pretty excited over Obama. My god, but politics are better than any baseball/football/kickball game ever.
I saw Control Room first, for example--a documentary about al-Jazeera during the invasion of Iraq. It's terribly informative about the process of selling the news during wartime and it focuses on the people behind al-Jazeera as well as the controversy that surrounds them. They have to be doing something right when both Donald Rumsfeld and Iraq's former Minister of Information accuse them of spreading lies and propaganda.
But anyway--Michael Moore. With Bowling for Columbine, I thought he was trying a little too hard in some scenes, like when he leaves the picture of the little girl outside Charleton Heston's mansion. That struck as being for the camera, not a documentation of what really happened. But with 9/11, there is not a single thing I can think of that was trying too hard. Maybe he realized he didn't need to--I don't know. But the movie really punched me in the gut. The stuff with Gore and the 2000 election at the beginning was a great way to start, because that still smarts for me, especially with how things have turned out. I like Gore a lot and I'd vote for him all over again.
The sequence on the attacks made me teary-eyed, as did the interview with the mother from Flint. The parts on military recruitment made me mad, and so did seeing Bush in that classroom trying to pretend like nothing was happening on the morning of the 11th. The movie has its own point of view, but Moore lets the facts tell the story more than he has in the past.
There is one Michael Moore kind of stunt in the film, and it feels pretty out of place. But aside from that, it makes for a powerful film and I'm glad it was made. I'm glad it was distributed and I hope lots and lots of people see it before the election in November.
On an unrelated note, I'm also glad that Barack Obama will be delivering the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in Boston. And I hope someone like Ditka runs against him, so Obama can stomp him. I'm not wildly enthusiastic about Kerry like I would have been about DEAN, but I am pretty excited over Obama. My god, but politics are better than any baseball/football/kickball game ever.
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I'm with you on Obama... he's a smart, articulate guy... I think he's got a very good future in politics. Unlike Kerry, you can vote for Barak because you believe *in* him, not just because you hate his opponent.