Fahrenheit 9/11
Jun. 30th, 2004 01:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
swehI guess it's almost required for anyone who has seen this film to write a review on their LJ or a newsgroup or get involved in a political debate or something.
I'm a bit of an oddity in that I'm an Englishman living in New York, and working just a few blocks from where the World Trade Center site is. I was in the office when the planes struck and was "locked in" as the buildings collapsed. Interesting times, indeed. My perspective is, therefore, perhaps slightly less biased (or maybe just differently biased) than that of an American; it wasn't my country being attacked; it wasn't my President spouting off (although Tony Blair did his own fair share).
To call it biased against Bush would be an understatement. There was no real attempt to be fair and balanced reporting. Pretty good going; propoganda for your favourite political party _and_ you get people to pay to watch it! OK, there were a few backhand slaps at his own party, in the context that _no_ senator would sign documents re the election, that they gave the President their full support for the war, and only one senator has a child serving in Iraq, but overall the film started on very much a "Bush __BAD__" theme. It treated him like a poor joke, a thief and someone who only got into power by manipulation and money. Nothing new there! This film made it seem like a comedy... to start with.
The handling of the WTC disaster itself was tastefully done. The screen was blank and we just heard recordings of what was going on, then we saw scenes of the aftermath; the people in shock, crying. This is one event that always causes me to cry and when I realised what the black screen was to foreshadow I started to cry myself. The pictures that followed recalled my own feelings; walking with Tori the next day, crying at the candlelit vigil...
We then cut to Bush. Even taking the films bias in mind, I started to get very angry at Bush. Seeing him sitting in the classroom listening to children read while the WTC disaster was happening, and not getting up and out of there appears to be inexcusable. Michael Moore's commentary actually detracted from this, making it sound almost comical ("oh no; one of my friends has betrayed me!"). I was thinking "dammit, a major tragedy has happened and you're just sitting there!" That's even without the benefit of hindsight, knowing what I know now. Ggrrrr
And there we finish with the WTC disaster. We don't follow the aftermath, the heros, the rebuilding. We switch straight back to attacks on Bush and the family. We see the Patriot Act, we get told how few laws are actually read by the Senators before they vote on them, we see how the Patriot Act has been abused, how there are insufficient resources to police it properly, and how the "terror threat level" are all used to keep the US population off guard, unbalanced, unsure. We see links between Bush and Saud, Bush and the Binladen family; we see handshakes and handshakes and handshakes. Very heavy handed film making. No subtlety at all.
At this point, around midway through the showing, the film ends and a new film, "The Horror Of War", starts. Well, that's how I see it! We switch from a "Bush __BAD__" film to a "what the fuck are we doing in Iraq?" film.
Initially Moore tries to bring in the same themes (money, friends, money, oil and money) but very soon he dwells on the horror of war; soldiers dieing, innocent civilians dead, dieing, confused, angry, a woman who had probably never thought of America in her life calling down the wrath of God on America for their bombing of her home, the deaths in her family, hostages, vigilanties and so on. We see how the soldiers are losing faith in the cause.
Switching back to "Hometown USA" (well, Moore's hometown, anyway) and we see the impact the war has had there. We see recruiters trying to get the youth to sign up, we see how everyone there has a relative in Iraq, and we see how one "Mrs Average American", proud of her family's military history, has been heart broken by losing her son.
It's at this point that I start to lose the plot. Well, yeah, sure... war is bad. People die. But what does this have to do with the original theme of the film? Once committed to a war this will happen. The film appears to lose it's "blame Bush for this mess" and dwells mainly on the horrors of war.
Our Mrs Average goes to Washington, to the White House, and we get some idea of how much anger there is on both sides and how poorly informed some people are on what is going on. Our Mrs Average is told by some well dressed bystander that the Muslim camped on the street complaining about her dead family was making it all up and when our lady cried in pain about her loss she was told to blame Binladen.
At an attempt to show double standards, Moore tries to get some Senators to get _their_ kids to sign up for a tour of duty in Iraq; only one Senator currently has a child serving. Now I realise what this segment of the film was all about; how the lower classes (the poor, the working classes, the "backbone" of America) are those who are losing out most from this war. They're the ones on the front line, facing enemy action. No wonder I lost the plot; we were telling a different story! Duh!
And yet there must have been something there that I missed; when the film finally gets back to slamming Bush the audience had become a lot more rowdy and were calling out whenever Bush and his crew appear. If the film had spent more of the war segment denigrating Bush for it then I could have understood it, but so much time was spent on the horror of war, and how ignorant people are, and the impact on the lower classes that this message was diluted.
All in all this film would have been better off being an hour shorter. Less time spent on the horrific images of the war and more time spent on the Bush angle and the message would have been that much stronger. As it stands this is a confused film.
Preaching to the choir? Well, sure! Any Bush supporter wouldn't sit through the first 20 minutes of it. Fair and honest reporting? No way. Likely to change the course of the election? Doubtful. Worth watching? Dunno.
I'm a bit of an oddity in that I'm an Englishman living in New York, and working just a few blocks from where the World Trade Center site is. I was in the office when the planes struck and was "locked in" as the buildings collapsed. Interesting times, indeed. My perspective is, therefore, perhaps slightly less biased (or maybe just differently biased) than that of an American; it wasn't my country being attacked; it wasn't my President spouting off (although Tony Blair did his own fair share).
To call it biased against Bush would be an understatement. There was no real attempt to be fair and balanced reporting. Pretty good going; propoganda for your favourite political party _and_ you get people to pay to watch it! OK, there were a few backhand slaps at his own party, in the context that _no_ senator would sign documents re the election, that they gave the President their full support for the war, and only one senator has a child serving in Iraq, but overall the film started on very much a "Bush __BAD__" theme. It treated him like a poor joke, a thief and someone who only got into power by manipulation and money. Nothing new there! This film made it seem like a comedy... to start with.
The handling of the WTC disaster itself was tastefully done. The screen was blank and we just heard recordings of what was going on, then we saw scenes of the aftermath; the people in shock, crying. This is one event that always causes me to cry and when I realised what the black screen was to foreshadow I started to cry myself. The pictures that followed recalled my own feelings; walking with Tori the next day, crying at the candlelit vigil...
We then cut to Bush. Even taking the films bias in mind, I started to get very angry at Bush. Seeing him sitting in the classroom listening to children read while the WTC disaster was happening, and not getting up and out of there appears to be inexcusable. Michael Moore's commentary actually detracted from this, making it sound almost comical ("oh no; one of my friends has betrayed me!"). I was thinking "dammit, a major tragedy has happened and you're just sitting there!" That's even without the benefit of hindsight, knowing what I know now. Ggrrrr
And there we finish with the WTC disaster. We don't follow the aftermath, the heros, the rebuilding. We switch straight back to attacks on Bush and the family. We see the Patriot Act, we get told how few laws are actually read by the Senators before they vote on them, we see how the Patriot Act has been abused, how there are insufficient resources to police it properly, and how the "terror threat level" are all used to keep the US population off guard, unbalanced, unsure. We see links between Bush and Saud, Bush and the Binladen family; we see handshakes and handshakes and handshakes. Very heavy handed film making. No subtlety at all.
At this point, around midway through the showing, the film ends and a new film, "The Horror Of War", starts. Well, that's how I see it! We switch from a "Bush __BAD__" film to a "what the fuck are we doing in Iraq?" film.
Initially Moore tries to bring in the same themes (money, friends, money, oil and money) but very soon he dwells on the horror of war; soldiers dieing, innocent civilians dead, dieing, confused, angry, a woman who had probably never thought of America in her life calling down the wrath of God on America for their bombing of her home, the deaths in her family, hostages, vigilanties and so on. We see how the soldiers are losing faith in the cause.
Switching back to "Hometown USA" (well, Moore's hometown, anyway) and we see the impact the war has had there. We see recruiters trying to get the youth to sign up, we see how everyone there has a relative in Iraq, and we see how one "Mrs Average American", proud of her family's military history, has been heart broken by losing her son.
It's at this point that I start to lose the plot. Well, yeah, sure... war is bad. People die. But what does this have to do with the original theme of the film? Once committed to a war this will happen. The film appears to lose it's "blame Bush for this mess" and dwells mainly on the horrors of war.
Our Mrs Average goes to Washington, to the White House, and we get some idea of how much anger there is on both sides and how poorly informed some people are on what is going on. Our Mrs Average is told by some well dressed bystander that the Muslim camped on the street complaining about her dead family was making it all up and when our lady cried in pain about her loss she was told to blame Binladen.
At an attempt to show double standards, Moore tries to get some Senators to get _their_ kids to sign up for a tour of duty in Iraq; only one Senator currently has a child serving. Now I realise what this segment of the film was all about; how the lower classes (the poor, the working classes, the "backbone" of America) are those who are losing out most from this war. They're the ones on the front line, facing enemy action. No wonder I lost the plot; we were telling a different story! Duh!
And yet there must have been something there that I missed; when the film finally gets back to slamming Bush the audience had become a lot more rowdy and were calling out whenever Bush and his crew appear. If the film had spent more of the war segment denigrating Bush for it then I could have understood it, but so much time was spent on the horror of war, and how ignorant people are, and the impact on the lower classes that this message was diluted.
All in all this film would have been better off being an hour shorter. Less time spent on the horrific images of the war and more time spent on the Bush angle and the message would have been that much stronger. As it stands this is a confused film.
Preaching to the choir? Well, sure! Any Bush supporter wouldn't sit through the first 20 minutes of it. Fair and honest reporting? No way. Likely to change the course of the election? Doubtful. Worth watching? Dunno.
