Michael and I

[poliphilo]

I have a beef with Michael Moore. My copy of Stupid White Men has some pages missing and others stuck in upside down and out of sequence. Shoddy goods- Michael- shoddy goods.

It's not a great book. Michael doesn't always know when to stop. He rants. I love rants- in their place, in bite sized portions on the Web- but a whole book of them? Naaah!

I liked Bowling for Columbine. The argument didn't altogether stack up (he didn't really make sense of Canada for instance) but I liked that. It made the film less like agit-prop, more like an opinionated essay. Doubt was allowed to creep around the edges of the arguments. And where there's doubt there's art.

I want to see the Iraq film. I can't get my head round the title though. Is it a riff on Fahrenheit 451? And if it is, how does that relate to the subject in hand? There's an idea there but it hasn't been properly honed. Michael's like that. He's smart but he's sloppy.

I could wish he was less sloppy. But if he were I guess he wouldn't charge in like he does. And we need someone who's prepared to charge in.

As for Disney- what goons! Now they look like George Bush's bitch and there's a whole new buzz around the movie. Moore is currently King of Cannes. I guess he would have been anyway, but thanks to them he's got a personal grievance to exploit on top of everything else.

I've been trying to think of cases where censorship has been a big success. I guess, in the nature of things, these are the cases we'll never hear about- where books, films, news stories, whatever, have been squashed so thoroughly they've completely disappeared. How often does that happen? Maybe more than I'd like to think. But on the other hand there are so many cases where the censor just ends up looking a fool. And if the work he tried to squash has staying power he's going to look a fool for ever and ever.

What do most people remember about Willaim Randolph Hearst? That he was the model for Kane and he tried to stop the movie. Fool! Bully! Philistine!

Comments

[balirus.livejournal.com]

The complete title is "Fahrenheit 9/11 - The Temperature Where Freedom Burns."

I agree with you in that he is sloppy. I think it's an integral part of his common-man presentation, he does it to try to connect to the ball-cap wearing crowd. The "investigative reporter" ambushes against the famous are what I find most amusing. Not that I thought of him as a documentarian before, but apparently with this new film he drops any and all pretense of being such by delivering a pure angry polemic against Bush. It has all the smell of an election-year device about it, but I'll watch it.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Quite apart from the message (guns are dangerous) Bowling for Columbine was an exciting piece of cinema. Moore is a remarkable film-maker- and that's the thing about him that interests me most.

[beentothemoon.livejournal.com]

He's not even a good filmmaker, technically and all his editing is off. I work for a huge film festival and I don't know a single person whose opinion I respect who thinks he's even a decent filmmaker.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Hmmmmm. Maybe his skills are primitive, but he keeps me in my seat, makes me want to know what's gonna happen next, and pulls of some memorable coups de theatre. Technique isn't everything.

[flapperjane.livejournal.com]

I wanted to tell you how much I loved you but I just couldn't lie while wearing a new Hermes scarf tied around my neck and red lipstick. I simply couldn't stand there like a lady and lie to you as though we were two common lovers in some dime store novella. You know the kind you keep dogeared and rolled up in your underwear drawer at your Mother's? You know I'm a snoop -- that's what attracted you to me; aside from my bluntness, my healthy American short sightedness and my dreams of a Sak's Credit of my very own!

I just wanted you to know what you were getting yourself into by marrying me, Kid. Afterall you're not only getting the Girl Next Door, you're getting a regular Girl Friday, a fabuleaux Chef and a world class hooker all rolled into one expensive -- rather, cher -- package. I am the kinda wife who knows how to go over BIG with the Boss and his Wife at schmoozy boozy tete a tetes! Heck, I'm even bringing Precious, my prize winning poodle. What more could a Future Businessman of America want for?

So when I say I adore this whole marriage idea; I love our dinners and cocktails and silent moonlit strolls, what I'm saying is I sure do like you -- for a relative stranger. And I have a feeling the person you think I am and the man you are pretending to be will sort themselves out nicely into separate vacations and bedrooms; a joint bank account and ocassional weekends and holidays.

Whaddya say, dahling?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Well, hon, I can't pretend but that your missive hasn't come as something of a body blow. I thought, see, that things were working out just fine between us. I'm a pretty simple guy underneath it all. I thought you understood that.

Those dime-store novel values of mine, they're real to me. Only I don't see them as dime-store, I see them as American. I thought you were with me when I talked about getting away from all the fakery of our parents' life-style. Listen, hon, when I talked about raising two kids behind a white picket fence I wasn't fooling!

I've passed your letter to Epstein. You know I was resisting his suggestion that we draw up a pre-marital agreement, but now I'm not so sure.

And maybe I need to say it now, just so there's no misunderstanding later. Sweetheart, I sure do hate that goddam pooch of yours!