Tag: Documentaries

Fight Club.

“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes.” That flaming liberal Dwight Eisenhower’s somber farewell address to the nation is the historical and thematic anchor for Eugene Jarecki’s documentary Why We Fight, a sobering disquisition on American militarism and foreign policy since 9/11. In essence, Why We Fight is the movie Fahrenheit 9/11 should have been. Like F911, this film preaches to the choir, but it also makes a more substantive critique of Dubya diplomacy and the 9/11-Iraq switcheroo, with much less of the grandstanding that marred Moore’s earlier documentary (and drove right-wing audiences berzerk.)

Sadly, the basic tale here is all-too-familiar by now. Ensconced in Dubya’s administration from the word go, the right-wing think-tank crowd (Wolfowitz, Perle, Kristol, etc.) used the tragedy of 9/11 as a pretext to enact all their neocon fantasies (spelled out in this 2000 Project for a New American Century report), beginning in Iraq. Taken into consideration with Cheney the Military-Contractor-in-Chief doling out fat deals to his Halliburton-KBR cronies from the Vice-President’s office, and members of Congress meekly signing off on every military funding bill that comes down the pike (partly because, as the film points out, weapons systems such as the B-1 or F-22 have a part built in every state), it seems uncomfortably clear that President Eisenhower’s grim vision has come to pass.

To help him rake this muck, Jarecki shrewdly gives face-time not only to learned critics of recent foreign-policy — CIA vet Chalmers Johnson, Gore Vidal (looking unwell) — but also to the neocons themselves. Richard Perle is here, saying (as always) insufferably self-serving things, and Bill Kristol glows like a kid in a candy store when he gets to talk up his role in fostering Dubya diplomacy. (Karen Kwiatkowski, a career military woman who watched the neocon coup unfold within the corridors of the Pentagon, also delivers some keen insights.) And, when discussing the corruption that festers in the heart of our Capitol, Jarecki brings out not only Charles Lewis of the Center for Public Integrity but that flickering mirage of independent-minded Republicanism, John McCain. (In fact, Jarecki encapsulates the frustrating problem with McCain in one small moment: Right after admitting to the camera that Cheney’s no-bid KBR deals “look bad”, the Senator happens to get a call from the Vice-President. In his speak-of-the-devil grimace of bemused worry, you can see him mentally falling into line behind the administration, as always.)

To be sure, Why We Fight has some problems. There’s a central tension in the film between the argument that Team Dubya is a corrupt administration of historical proportions and the notion that every president since Kennedy has been party to an increasingly corrupt system, and it’s never really resolved satisfactorily here. Jarecki wants you to think that this documentary is about the rise of the Imperial Presidency across five decades, but, some lip service to Tonkin notwithstanding, the argument here is grounded almost totally in the Age of Dubya. (I don’t think it’s a bad thing, necessarily, but it is the case.) And, sometimes the critique seems a little scattershot — Jarecki seems to fault the Pentagon both for KBR’s no-bid contracts and, when we see Lockheed and McDonnell-Douglas salesmen going head-to-head, for bidding on contracts. (Still, his larger point is valid — As Chalmers Johnson puts it, “When war becomes that profitable, you’re going to see more of it.“)

Also, the film loses focus at times and meanders along tangents — such as the remembrances of two Stealth Fighter pilots on the First Shot Fired in the Iraq war, or the glum story of an army recruit in Manhattan looking to turn his life around. This latter tale, along with the story of Wilton Sekzer, a retired Vietnam Vet and NYPD sergeant who lost his son on 9/11 and wants somebody to pay, are handled with more grace and less showmanship than similar vignettes in Michael Moore’s film, but they’re in the same ballpark. (As an aside, I was also somewhat irked by shots of NASA thrown in with the many images of missile tests and ordnance factories. Ok, both involve rockets, research, and billions of dollars, but space exploration and war are different enough goals that such a comparison merits more unpacking.)

Nevertheless, Why We Fight is well worth-seeing, and hopefully, this film will make it out to the multiplexes. If nothing else, it’ll do this country good to ponder anew both a president’s warning about the “disastrous rise of misplaced power,” and a vice-president’s assurance that we’ll be “greeted as liberators.”

Dance Hall Days.

On my sister‘s advice, I went to go see Ballets Russes yesterday evening at the Film Forum, and she was right: It’s a stunning film, one that I’d even recommend to people who have little-to-no interest in ballet. Like the best documentaries — and this is the best I’ve seen in some time — Ballets Russes transcends its immediate topic to capture larger and more ephemeral truths. The movie not only brings to life a bygone era in the arts and helps to explain the current popularity of ballet in the US and around the world — it also powerfully reflects on both the inexorable passing of time and the timelessness of dance, its magical capacity to wash away years and overcome human frailty. Like a perfectly executed ensemble piece, Ballets Russes can take your breath away.

After a brief introduction to the dancers of the Ballets Russes, who reconvene in New Orleans in 2000, the documentary shifts to 1929, with the death of renowned ballet impresario Serge Diaghilev and the formation of the Ballet Russes de Monte Carlo, a successor company to Diaghilev’s famed troupe. Briefly artistic-directed by a young George Balanchine (who’ll show up again in the story, after a stint training elephants at the circus) and headlined by a trio of newly-discovered Russian “baby ballerinas,” the Ballet Russes de Monte Carlo soon splits into rival companies — one headed by dancer-choreographer Leonide Massine, the other manned by financial backer Colonel Wassily de Basil. After wrangling over ballerinas and staffing their respective companies with ringers from other ensembles, the two Ballets Russes duel over London audiences and US contracts, until the exigencies of World War II force both to travel West. There, they attempt to stave off financial collapse by spreading the ballet meme (via steam train and Hollywood song-and-dance) across the New World.

The story of the Ballets Russes is told not only through an impressive amount of archival dance footage (which loses none of its forcefulness despite the occasional grainy stock), but also via interviews with the surviving dancers of the rival troupes, and herein lies the documentary’s considerable dramatic heft. Every single one of the many interviewees — which include Alicia Markova, Maria Tallchief, and Frederic Franklin (who still appears in ABT’s “Swan Lake” well into his nineties) — comes off as a vivacious, multifaceted personality with tales to tell, and it’s extraordinary to watch them shake off the years when speaking of their experiences or dancing. Former ballerina (and coquettish heartbreaker) Nathalie Krassovska — who, like several of the participants, passed away since the film was finished — lights up like a little girl when she shows off her dance studio. Later, she and George Zoritch (in his prime at right, now an eighty-something gym rat in Tuscon, AZ) attempt a pas de deux from Giselle, and, although it’s clearly a physical struggle, it’s endearing to watch them rejoice in their old, shared language.

And the same goes for many other participants in the film, who have spread across the globe in a ballet diaspora since the collapse of the company in 1962. Aged, wizened faces break into impish grins when an old memory surfaces, and, when these former stars show off a dance flourish to their students, it’s exhilarating to see their enthusiasm, and the flashes of grace that accompany it. In all honesty, I’d like to have heard more about the original Ballet Russes here (Diaghilev’s outfit), and the film loses focus somewhat in the fifties and sixties. (More of a general sense of history would’ve been nice, too — The Depression isn’t mentioned, Hitler and WWII seem to show up out of the blue, and, other than a fascinating aside involving black dancer Raven Wilkinson’s travails with the KKK during one of the Ballet Russes’ southern swings, there’s very little outside context here.) Nevertheless, Ballets Russes is an amazing documentary and an impressive testament to the idea that, while dancers come and go, the dance is forever, and to embrace it as a calling is a life well lived.

The Worst Joke Ever.


“You see there’s this cat burglar who can’t see in the dark…” No, not that one…The Aristocrats, which I heard told several times over in the first leg of my Labor Day movie marathon. By now, you’ve probably heard the setup for both the documentary and the joke…but, just in case, a gaggle of famous comedians tell their respective versions of a crusty and filthy old vaudeville yarn involving a “family act” audition in an agent’s office. The name of the act, as the punch-line tells us, is “the Aristocrats” (or occasionally “the Sophisticates” or “the Debonairs.”) The act itself varies in the telling, but generally includes lots of micturition, bowel-loosening, vomiting, sodomy, incest, bestiality, and sundry other vile depradations you usually can only see on cable TV. And the funniness of the joke depends a good deal on the talents and twisted imagination of the teller. All in all, I’d say the movie is funnier than the joke and worth catching (if you’re not easily offended), but it’s nothing you need to rush out and see in the theater.

In all honesty, be it due to exposure to Deadwood, Grand Theft Auto, or the school bus, I found most iterations of the joke less transgressive than they were just repetitive. While some comedians bomb with the joke (Taylor Negron, Lisa Lampanelli, David Brenner, and Emo Phillips, to whom the years have not been kind), others seem to have never heard it (Chris Rock, Eddie Izzard), and still others hedge their bets (Paul Reiser, Drew Carey), I’d say up to 85% or so of the tellers just seem content to swim around in the same sex-and-defecating pool like demented eighth graders afflicted with the giggles. Sick-and-twisted-funny, sure, but not over and over again (which is why the movie wisely begins throwing in a mime version, two magic versions, and other more idiosyncratic iterations after awhile.)

Still, some comedians do shine with the material. George Carlin and Bill Maher in particular offer sound insights into the joke’s past and present. (As Maher and Lewis Black note, the Aristocrats stand in increasing danger of being overtaken by Reality TV.) Martin Mull, Carrie Fisher, “Christopher Walken,” and Sarah Silverman deserves points for telling roundabout or slightly off-kilter versions of the same sordid story. And Bob Saget gets a gold star for performing a bizarre career self-immolation and running with easily one of the most inventive and disgusting versions of the joke…no more America’s Funniest Home Videos, for him, I’d wager. (Jason Alexander’s isn’t bad, either.)

Much is made of a cathartic public telling of the joke by Gilbert Gottfried soon after 9/11, but, frankly, it doesn’t come across. In fact, in a way that version belies the problem I had with most tellings of the joke. By avoiding the 9/11 tragedy to focus on ungodly shagging and bodily fluids, Gottfried wasn’t being transgressive — he was playing it safe (and, to his credit, uniting the comic world with a joke they all shared, which was more likely his intention.) Still, Jeffrey Ross’ riposte to Rob Schneider that night — “Hasn’t there been enough bombing in this city?” — seems closer to the anarchic, tasteless, subversive, and shocking spirit the Aristocrats needs to be anything more than an endless litany of fart jokes. Different strokes for different folks, I know. But, given that I was watching the film while the Aristocrats in office bumbled their way through the tragedy of errors that was Katrina, I just found myself thinking that, in today’s dark times, the strictly vulgarian canoodling of most versions of the joke seemed, well, quaint, out-dated, and devoid of edge…in some ways, even tame, or as tame as a joke involved incest, bestiality, and sodomy can be. (For their part, the masterminds behind The Onion are, I think, the only comedians to broach politics in the film.)

Not to miss the forest for the trees, though, I wasn’t really brooding on this during the film so much as laughing at every third or fourth version of the joke…which, if you think about it, isn’t all that bad a hit rate. So, check out The Aristocrats on cable if you don’t mind the dirty-talk…but, please, don’t try this at home.

The Imperial March.

In a bid to spend a few hours out of the unrelenting Maui sunshine this past weekend, we exchanged Aloha for Antarctica and caught the well-received March of the Penguins. Brimming with impressive footage of the Emperor Penguins’ arduous yearly breeding cycle in the world’s most inhospitable place, and presided over by an avuncular Morgan Freeman, March definitely makes for a pleasant and diverting moviegoing experience, and seemed a great movie to take the kids to. Yet, as appealing as it is, March seems somewhat misplaced on the big screen, given that — ultimately — it’s not all that different from what you can catch on the Discovery Channel most times of the day…but given the particularly lousy crop of late-summer movie fare at the moment, perhaps there’s something to be said for quality nature docs writ large. Regardless, big-screen or small-screen, March of the Penguins is worth viewing, if only to appreciate anew how strange, delicate, unforgiving, and surprising our world can be (and to discover that there’s much more to penguins than Opus and Oswald Cobblepot.)

King of the Underworld

Despite feeling kinda rotten, I did venture out to the movies on Saturday night (armed with a hefty bag of throat lozenges) for an impromptu double feature. At the top of the bill was James Cameron’s IMAX extravaganza Aliens of the Deep and, all I can say is, if Cameron wants to make Battle Angel Alita using this funky 3-D technology, hail to the King. Granted, I haven’t seen a 3-D movie since the days before Captain Eo. Nevertheless, the effect was much improved, and made what could have been a staid underwater documentary comprised of what look to be outtakes from The Abyss into a riveting, jaw-dropping wonder.

I’ll admit, I was also fond of Cameron’s central conceit here, which is that our best bet for finding life in this solar system — at Europa, say — would be of the kind inexplicably thriving around thermal vents in the darkest, deepest parts of the ocean, where the sun never shines (and thus photosynthesis never takes place.) And what strange life it is! Innumerable swarming shrimp scuttle between ice-cold and boiling-hot water with nary an antenna twitch. Strange symbiotic tube worms ensnare food for their inner bacteria, which digests for them. Ethereal jellyfish float by, improbably yet undeniably alive. And, thanks to the 3-D, it seems you can reach out and touch all of these creatures just before your eyes — in fact, you can see them better in their natural habitat than any human being possibly could. It’s really quite amazing.

Like I said, I don’t know if Aliens of the Deep would be everyone’s cup of tea — most of the film just involves young astrobiologists and underwater explorers enthusing over their wild and crazy jobs in tiny little subs. But, whenever a strange new animal popped up on the screen, and particuarly when the camera hurtles past the moons of Jupiter on its CGI-way to far-flung Europa, I thought to myself, “Now, that’s Edutainment!”

Let Me Clear My Throat.


As both a path-breaking porno flick and a Nixon-felling secret informant, it may have been surprisingly successful. But, unfortunately, as a documentary, the one-sided Inside Deep Throat is a superfluous and self-congratulatory tale that’s more frustrating than fulfilling. Forgoing any attempt at analytic rigor, the movie seems designed mainly to make the audience feel enlightened and blue-state cosmopolitan just for showing up. The most you can say for it is that it’s Kinsey without the nuance.

In the opening moments, the documentary tries to establish its serious pedigree with a motley crew of left-leaning talking heads remembering their “first time” at Deep Throat: Norman Mailer, Erica Jong, Camille Paglia, Bill Maher, Dick Cavett (looking very well-preserved), Hef, Gore Vidal, John Waters, etc. Ok, so far, so good. But, then the interminably smug Dennis Hopper voiceover kicks in, and the movie begins its slow lurch into irredeemable goofiness.

By the end, that lurch has become a full-on tailspin. The upshot of the film seems to be this: Deep Throat was no mere skin flick. It was about art, freedom, liberating female sexuality, and breaking restrictive social barriers…in short, it was about America.(Conversely, all subsequent porn, particularly in the post-Boogie Nights VHS-era, has been about commerce, exploitation, degradation, and, well, you know.) Moreover, the release of Deep Throat marked an epochal moment in the burgeoning culture wars, and this movie leaves no doubt which side it’s on — various would-be moral arbiters straight out of right-wing central casting are interviewed at times, and naturally they all make Ken Starr look like Larry Flynt. Meanwhile, the admittedly-dubious conviction of Deep Throat-star Harry Reems is treated like the worst threat to constitutional liberty in decades, a cross between the Hollywood Ten and the trial of Sir Thomas More.

While I think Deep Throat‘s artistic merits are vastly overrated here — it’s a ludicrous porno that improbably tapped into the zeitgeist and fell ass-backwards into crossover appeal, no more, no less — I’m generally sympathetic to the case being made in this documentary about First Amendment freedoms and the snickering, adolescent way our culture handles adult sexuality most of the time. But Inside Deep Throat‘s bullheadedly partisan and hyperbolic tone does a disservice to its central arguments. In other words, like the stereotype of the industry it sought to illuminate, Inside Deep Throat turned out to be breathless and brainless…you’d probably be better off watching whatever’s on Skinemax.

2004 in Film.

Happy New Year, everyone. Inauspiciously for 2005, it looks like I’m starting the year a day late on the end-of-2004 movie roundup…but better late than never. As you probably already guessed, this year’s film list will be the first in four years without a Peter Jackson Tolkien adaptation in the #1 spot (although I’m still keeping it warm for The Hobbit in 2008.) Nevertheless, my top choice this year was an easy one, and those of y’all who come ’round here often can probably figure it out.

Top 20 Films of 2004:
[2000/2001/2002/2003]

1) Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The one true classic of 2004, Eternal Sunshine has only grown in my estimation since its initial release in March. (David Edelstein’s take on it as one of Harvard philosopher Stanley Cavell‘s remarriage comedies is well worth reading.) A heartfelt examination of love, loss, and memory, Eternal Sunshine was also a strikingly adult take on romance and relationships, the kind you usually don’t get from Hollywood. With great performances from a caged Jim Carrey and an electric Kate Winslet, the film managed to be both an earnest, passionate love story and a wistful paean to those person-shaped holes we all carry in our hearts and memories. Along with Annie Hall and High Fidelity, it goes down as one of my all-time favorite films about the mysteries of love. (Why even bother? We need the eggs.)

2) Garden State. Writer-director Zach Braff’s “anti-Graduate” debut was a small but touching ode to home that, along with reviving Natalie Portman as an actress and offering the best soundtrack of the year, delivered exactly what it promised. A bit hokey at times, sure, but Garden State wore its heart on its sleeve and, for the most part, got away with it. It was a witty and eloquent voyage to the Jersey burbs and a testament to the proposition that as Paul Weller put it, it’s never too late to make a brand new start.

3) The Incredibles. Pixar has been delivering well-constructed eye-popping wonders since Toy Story, and The Incredibles is the best of the lot. I figured it might be awhile before a movie topped Spiderman 2 as a sheer comic book spectacle, but, as it turned out, The Incredibles did it only a few months later. One of the best comic book films ever made, The Incredibles was two hours of unmitigated fanboy fun. I’m going to go out on a limb and say it’s probably also the best Fantastic Four film we’re ever going to see.

4) Sideways. Like a fine 1961 Cheval Blanc, Alexander Payne’s elegiac toast to California wine country and the regrets and indignities of middle-age has a tendency to linger in the senses. Paul Giamatti must tire of playing depressive, barely sociable losers, but he’s great at it here…Sideways isn’t as funny as Election, but it is a memorable trip.

5) Spiderman 2. A definite improvement on the first adventure of your friendly neighborhood wallcraller, Spiderman 2 was a perfectly made summer film that stayed true to the spirit of Peter Parker. Along with X2, this is the gold standard for comic book-to-film adaptations right now…let’s hope Batman Begins is up to snuff.

6) Shaun of the Dead. Although it lost its footing shambling to its conclusion, Shaun of the Dead was great fun for the first two-thirds of its run, and it’s now probably my favorite zombie movie (everyone should have one.) A much-needed dry British humor fix to tide us over until Hitchhiker’s Guide.

7) The Aviator. A bit on the long side, Scorsese’s life of Howard Hughes is most fun when it stays away from the airfields and lounges about Old Hollywood. Two very clean thumbs up.

8) The Assassination of Richard Nixon. A dark, unflinching 90-minute descent into violent futility. I originally had this before The Aviator, then figured the degree of difficulty on Scorsese’s flick was much, much higher. Nevertheless, this funereal biopic for non-billionaire crazies, while grim and not much fun, was well-made and well-performed, and I expect it’ll stay with me for awhile.

9) The Bourne Supremacy. Perhaps a bit too much like its predecessor, Bourne II was still a better Bond than anything we’ve seen in the past 20 years. Paul Greengrass’ shakicam work here bodes well for Rorshach in The Watchmen.

10) Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkhaban. It’d be hard to make a better film of Harry Potter’s adventures at Hogwarts than Alfonso Cuaron did here — Azkhaban managed to capture the dry wit and subversive spirit of the books that’s so missing in the Chris Columbus movies. That being said, Azkaban also made it clear that much of the fun of Rowling’s tomes is uncapturable on film. What was great fun to read on the page ended up seeming like Back to the Future II on the screen. With that in mind, Year 6 begins on 7/16.

11) Ocean’s 12. Two swollen hours of Soderberghian glamour and inside baseball. Not everyone’s cup of tea, I know, but I found it an agreeable improvement on Ocean’s 11. (Don Cheadle’s accent is still terrible, tho’.)

12) Touching the Void. Snap! Aigh! Crunch! Aigh! It’d be hard to forget anything as memorable as Shattered Femur Theater. Well worth seeing, if you can stand the pain.

13) Fahrenheit 9/11. Hmmm…perhaps this should be higher. I definitely left the theater in an angry froth (not that it takes much)…unfortunately, apparently so did all the freepers.

14) My Architect. An excellent documentary on Louis Kahn, brilliant architect and terrible family man. Alas, it’s also a less-excellent documentary on Kahn’s son, and his Oprah-like quest for self-acceptance.

15) Kinsey. Take that, red staters.

16) Hero. A memorable meditation on love, power, and kick-ass kung-fu, until its train-wreck derailing in the last half-hour.

17) The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. As I said yesterday, Aquatic was a jaunty Wes Anderson joyride that nevertheless gets a little lost in its terminal cuteness. When you care more about the leaving-behind of Cody the three-legged dog than you do the death of a major character, there’s a problem.

18) I Heart Huckabees. Huckabees had its heart in the right place, and made for a decently appealing night at the movies…but it also had a terminal-cute problem.

19) Collateral. If the movie had maintained the promise of its first hour throughout, Michael Mann’s Collateral would have been a top ten contender. Alas, it all falls apart once Tom Cruise goes bugnut psycho in da club.

20) Kill Bill, Vol. 2. There was probably one really good movie somewhere in the two Kill Bills. The second half was closer to it than the first.

Not Seen: Bad Education, Before Sunset, Finding Neverland, Friday Night Lights, Harold and Kumar, Hotel Rwanda, Maria Full of Grace, Million Dollar Baby, Ray, Spanglish

Worst Movies of the Year: Van Helsing, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, The Chronicles of Riddick, The Village, Code 46, Closer, Alexander, 21 Grams (2003)

Biggest Disappointment: The Ladykillers

Ho-Hum: Team America: World Police, The Alamo, House of Flying Daggers, Troy, King Arthur, Anchorman, Blade: Trinity, Shrek 2

Worth a Rental: Mean Girls, The Manchurian Candidate,
Hellboy, The Machinist, City of God (2003)

Best Actor: Jim Carrey, Eternal Sunshine; Paul Giamatti, Sideways; Sean Penn, The Assassination of Richard Nixon.
Best Actress: Kate Winslet, Eternal Sunshine.

Best Supporting Actor: Thomas Haden Church, Sideways
Best Supporting Actress: Cate Blanchett, The Aviator; Virginia Madsen, Sideways.

2005: On paper, it’s looking like a better year for film, fanboy and otherwise, than 2004. The slate includes Star Wars Episode III, Batman Begins, The Chronicles of Narnia, All the King’s Men, PJ’s King Kong, Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Spielberg’s War of the Worlds, Gilliam’s The Brothers Grimm, Polanski’s Oliver Twist, Malick’s The New World, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Constantine, Sin City, Fantastic Four, and my own most-anticipated project, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. So here’s to the new year!

Turning up the heat.


Well, I’m a bit behind on this one, but I finally got out of the apartment to catch Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 yesterday afternoon. And the verdict? Well, it’s undoubtedly an extremely powerful piece of cinema. And, judging from the reactions of the afternoon crowd, it looks as if it might do some real good in crystallizing popular discontent with the Bush administration outside of the blog-world echo chamber. Still, even though I know Moore is playing by the rules set by right-wing freak shows like Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, I found myself wishing at times that he had played F911 a little straighter. Simply put, Dubya and his cronies are guilty of so much blatant incompetence and documentable malfeasance that it’s disappointing that Moore feels he has to rely on cheapshots and push-button emotions some of the time.

If you’ve been keeping up with pretty much any lefty blog since 2000 (including this one), the central and most powerful allegations made here — that Dubya and the Neocons played bait-and-switch on the American people in Iraq and used 9/11 as a pretext for all kinds of terrible legislation, while doing pathetically little to minimize the actual threat of terrorism — will not come as a surprise. Still, when the data is laid out before you here like ducks in a row, from the Florida fiasco in 2000 through to the recent stonewalling of the 9/11 commission a few weeks ago, the continued pattern of incompetence and mendacity that has characterized this administration becomes unmistakably clear. As the story unfolds, Moore offers plenty of intriguing footage — Bush’s 7 minutes of Pet Goat superfluousness may perhaps be overemphasized by now, but it’s still out-and-out eerie. Equally damning is footage of Dubya at the ranch a month prior to 9/11, in which he has absolutely no clue what his agenda is for the day and, whatsmore, doesn’t seem to much care (particularly when contrasted with his obvious enthusiasm for armadillos exhibited a few scenes later.)

But while there are plenty of blows landed, I ultimately thought that Fahrenheit 9/11 would have been much more impressive if it had focused more closely on the facts and avoided the more obvious attempts at sentiment. For example, instead of examining in detail the clear civil liberties transgressions occurring at the Gitmo Gulag and elsewhere under the Patriot Act, or noting the discrepancies in its enforcement (no gun checks?) under Attorney General-cum-balladeer John Ashcroft, Moore spends too much time interviewing an aging weightlifter and various Fresno peace activists — all of whom have run afoul of goofy anti-terrorist inquiries — for laughs. Similarly, instead of talking about Dubya’s spiking of the Nunn-Lugar act or his continued cutting of First Responder funding, the film dinks around Western Oregon with two underfunded deputies – as a result, I thought the larger point about Bush’s failure to protect the homeland was lost.

As the film moves overseas, the problems with F911 become more evident. Regarding the war in Afghanistan, Moore talks about a proposed UNOCAL pipeline to the exclusion of virtually anything else, which I think invites charges of shrillness (Exhibit A: The Bonanza riff) and blurs one of the most serious charges against this administration – that it gave up a chance to catch Osama Bin Laden in order to play regime change in Iraq. Speaking of Baghdad, I think Moore would have done better to talk more about missing WMD and lies to the UN and spent less time with Lila Lipscomb, the mother of a deceased US soldier. This last section of the film is undeniably powerful, but it also feels extremely manipulative, particularly as it’s hard to envision very many situations where a mother’s grief wouldn’t be harrowing to behold. (The same goes for the grisly scenes of charred bodies and horrifically wounded Iraqi children.)

Still, what do I know? Perhaps Fahrenheit 9/11 needs these human touches to get its point across to a larger audience, a goal which it so far seems to be accomplishing with great aplomb. The fact is, Michael Moore can undoubtedly be a blowhard with grating populist pretensions, but if we had any semblance of a functioning national media these days, Fahrenheit 9/11 would have been a non-event. In the absence of anything like an independently critical television press, and given the existence of such a well-oiled, well-funded right-wing propaganda machine these days, perhaps somebody out there had to co-opt conservative talk-radio techniques to get the message out. I’m more of a “destroy the ring” than a “use the ring” kinda guy, but, as I said, what do I know? I could write in this space a hundred times over and still never reach an infinitesimal fraction of the people who will see this film and be newly angered by the idiotic and unethical behavior of this administration.

In short, if a picture is worth a 1000 words, this film is worth 10,000 blogs – by stringing so many of the Bush-bashing beads together in such entertaining and moving fashion, Fahrenheit 9/11 should bring the heart of the anti-Dubya critique right to the Heartland. I just wish it had covered its flank a little better by sticking to the cold, hard facts about the national embarrassment of historic proportions that is George W. Bush, rather than indulging every so often in cheap laughs and reflexive sentiment.

Bowling for Dubya.

So the word emerging from Cannes on Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 is very positive so far. I’m very curious to see what kind of reaction this film will get stateside, once the distribution situation has been resolved. Hopefully, it’ll end up doing more than just preaching to the converted in arthouses across America, as it sounds like it has the potential to be very big.