Fahrenheit 9/11

FAHRENHEIT 9/11

Rating: A

Moore's style finally finds a match with his subject matter.

Michael Moore is back, this time profiling the unsettlingly close relationships between the Bush family and the bin Ladens (yep, those bin Ladens), as well as digging into the real motivations behind the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. A theme first broached in his previous Bowling for Columbine, that American society is inundated by fear, once again plays a strong supporting role, as does the theme of the poor being exploited in the interests of Big Business.

The main problem I've had with previous Moore efforts is his tendency to mock his subjects. Although in Bowling for Columbine, I couldn't get too bent out of shape watching barely-literate gun cranks making fools of themselves, in Roger & Me much of the ridicule was cruel and mean-spirited. Fortunately, here Moore saves the barbs for more deserving targets, such as President Bush and his staff (of which there are plenty to go around), as well as for those attempting to profit from the World Trade Center tragedy. In one segment which looks like it's straight from a Saturday Night Live parody, we're shown a commercial for a steel "safe room" people can install in their homes to seek refuge from intruders. Sitting inside this glorified outhouse, the salesman comments that the homeowner could enjoy a bottle of Bordeaux while being totally safe from the hypothetical dangers outside. You really have to wonder where Moore manages to dig these things up.

It's often amazing what's said by people who know they're being filmed. At a white-tie fundraiser, Bush proclaims to his dinner guests, "You're an impressive group. The haves, and the have-mores. Some people call you the elite. I call you my base." At a conference for American companies seeking contracts to rebuild Iraq, one speaker trumpets from the podium, "Once the oil gets flowing, [business] is only going to get better. Don't worry, whatever it costs, the [U.S.] government will pay for it. Build relationships - once the oil starts flowing, there'll be enough money for everyone." Then there are those moments that are almost too "good" to be true. Britney Spears (chewing gum, no less) is asked by an interviewer if she trusts President Bush. "Oh yes," she intones, "I think we should just trust our president and every decision that he makes." If there was a defining Zeitgeist for the collective American cluelessness leading up to the Iraq war, I suggest we just witnessed it there. Then when Katie Couric proclaims on-air to a Navy SEAL, "I just want you to know, I think Navy SEALS rock!", it serves as an apt one-sentence summary of the mass media's woefully shallow (if not outrightly dishonest) portrayal of the war. Unfortunately, Moore ends the clip there, so we don't get to hear Couric's next sentence complaining no one takes her seriously as a journalist.

One of the more moving pieces involves Mrs. Lila Lipscomb and her family. Moore first encounters her when he returns to his hometown of Flint, Michigan, and finds her counseling the huge throngs of unemployed in that former General Motors stronghold. She unabashedly endorses the armed services as an ideal way for the young men and women of Flint to escape their impoverished circumstances and bleak futures. Fate later takes a very cruel twist when her own son is killed in a helicopter crash in Iraq. The film's chronology implies Moore's initial interview with her occurred before the tragedy, and frankly, I find it impossible to believe she would have said the things she did had her son already been dead at that point. (If so, it's not the first time a Moore interview has later taken on unanticipated significance. On a lesser scale, in Roger & Me Moore interviewed the shallow and self-centered Miss Michigan during a chance encounter at a parade in Flint. Two weeks later she won the 1988 Miss America pageant, adding an exclamation point to Moore's cynical take on American society.)

With so much that can be said about the duplicity of the Bush administration in connection with the Iraq war, it's almost inevitable that Moore leaves some things out. Still, one of his major contentions is that the attack on Iraq was planned well in advance of 9/11, and that the administration cynically exploited a national tragedy to further its agenda. It's therefore somewhat puzzling he omits mention of the "Project for the New American Century" (do an internet search), which proves that exact point in black and white, or Condoleeza Rice's self-damning admission to the New Yorker that she instructed her staff to think up ways to "capitalize on the opportunities" presented by September 11th. If Moore was truly unaware of these items, it betrays a certain sloppiness in his research.

To be sure, there's still some of Moore's trademark grandstanding. After Congressman John Conyers admits that he and most of his peers didn't bother to read the Patriot Act before signing it into law (and if that admission doesn't send chills down your spine, what will?), Moore rides around the Capitol grounds in an ice cream truck, reading the act over a loudspeaker. In another sequence, he ambushes members of Congress in the street, urging them to enlist their children in the armed forces. It's silly, but at the same time it effectively makes its point.

Bowling for Columbine received considerable criticism for its treatment of the facts in some of the matters it portrayed onscreen. While some of the criticisms proved to be false, others (especially involving Moore's temporal hijinks with Charlton Heston's NRA speeches) were justified. Predictably, a barrage of criticism has now been leveled at his latest effort. However, this time around most of the complaints have little substance. For example, concerning Moore's aforementioned confrontation of members of Congress, a critic complains one of the lawmakers Moore solicits doesn't have children. So how does that change anything about the point Moore is making? Another critic finds fault with Moore showing scenes of Iraqi streets before the war, with children playing and men and women peacefully going about their business. Apparently, Moore shouldn't be allowed to show prewar shots of Iraq, even if they are, in fact, prewar shots of Iraq. When a flurry of bombs erupts in a tremendous explosion encompassing several city blocks, the same critic whines that it was a military target being hit. Moore never states otherwise - the shot comes as a counterpoint to a clip showing Donald Rumsfeld blathering about the "humanity" and precision of the bombing campaign. Yet another complaint is with Moore's statement that the Iraqi army had never murdered any Americans. As far as I can tell, that statement is factually correct. The critic cites the alleged Iraq-Al Qaida links, and Saddam's public support for Palestinian suicide bombers. First of all, the Iraq-Al Qaida "links" were never credible to begin with, and have since been thoroughly discredited, Dick Cheney's self-serving state-of-denial notwithstanding. Second, the Palestinian/Israeli conflict is an entirely separate issue, with the U.S. attempting to maintain some vague semblance of neutrality, and the implication that "attack on Israel" = "attack on America" is not only unfounded, but also a bit presumptuous.

It's worth mentioning the efforts that were mounted to try to suppress this film. An organization calling itself "Move America Forward" claimed to be a grassroots movement, and embarked on a massive campaign to pressure theater owners not to show the film - going so far as to threaten massive boycotts because Moore's film was told from a "biased perspective." Four points:

1. In spite of Move America Forward's apparent love for objective reporting, they're strangely silent about overtly biased programs such as Fox News and Rush Limbaugh. Why do you suppose this is?

2. The "grassroots" movement was exposed as the fabrication of Republican public relations firm Russo Marsh & Rogers. Somehow, this doesn't exactly scream honesty and integrity.

3. These are the same people who will turn around, wave the flag, and pontificate about the greatness of freedom of speech and how our forefathers gave their lives to protect it. Anyone else find it slightly ironic that this film's namesake, Fahrenheit 451, was about the organized suppression of anti-government ideas?

4. The attempt to keep people from seeing this film has been a miserable failure. As of this writing, Fahrenheit 9/11 has taken in over $100 million in domestic box office, and is an unqualified smash hit. Maybe Coke should consider hiring Russo Marsh & Rogers to work for Pepsi.