Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004)
Starring Michael Moore.
Directed by Michael Moore.
Rated R.
Grade: NG
"You want your child. It's out of sync; a parent is not supposed to bury their child."
The irresistible temptation in writing about Fahrenheit 9/11 is to write about politics, not about the film. I firmly believe that a critic can only be valuable if he brings all of his baggage -- political, emotional or otherwise -- into the movie with him and then sorts it out on the page, but it has proven impossible for me to even begin deconstructing Michael Moore's enraged polemic as a piece of cinema. I can tell you that it is an important film; if you want to know how good it is, you might ask someone else.
Right now, on the brink of a presidential election that I am convinced will decide everything from the fate of my family to the fate of the country and the world at large, I am incapable of seeing Fahrenheit 9/11 as anything but an absolute good. It inspired an Oskar Schindler-like impulse in me, the desire to pay as many Republicans as I could afford to go see it. If a measurable percentage of the public takes a look at this movie, a scenario under which President Bush gets reelected starts to seem inconceivable. But I'm an optimist.
Yes, I am aware that Michael Moore hasn't won any awards for veracity in documentary filmmaking. Yeah, I know that he tends to pick and choose facts to fit his intentions and then manipulate them further in the editing room. But let me ask you this: who labeled Moore a documentarian, anyway? Did Moore? These problems go away when one starts seeing the pudgy provocateur as more of an opinion columnist than a journalist. He has a point of view and a thesis, and he sets out to prove his case; he doesn't lie, and sometimes, as in Bowling for Columbine, he doesn't arrive at the conclusion he was expecting.
Fahrenheit 9/11 actually features more investigative journalism than I am used to from Moore, and some of it is impressive. Patiently, methodically, with surprising focus and determination, he works to establish a connection between the Bush cabal and both the Saudi Arabian royal family and the Bin Laden family. It cannot be a harmless factoid that Osama's brethren were flown out of the country immediately after the September 11th attack without being subjected to questioning by investigators. It cannot be a coincidence that the name of James Bath, long-time money manager for the Bin Ladens, was blacked out on Bush's military records, where he was mentioned alongside the President. It cannot be mere liberal defeatism to point out that the Carlyle Group, an investment conglomerate that counts Bush Sr. as an employee, also counts the Bin Ladens as multi-billion dollar investors, and that both the Bush and Bin Laden families stand to make billions from the War on Whatever that we are currently waging. Say what you will about Moore, his politics, or his tactics; here's what he has presented. Now either refute it or admit it.
As expected, Moore throws the book at Bush, painting a hideously frightening picture of an Orwellian monolith manipulating the public with visions of war and terror for its own nefarious ends (Orwell himself assists Moore in crafting a chilling conclusion to his movie). The question of whether the President is stupid or evil is answered with a resounding "both," as Bush is shown to be a bumbling incompetent with a gift for bald-faced treachery and surrounded by any number of shrewd and well-paid handlers. The man who first called the election for Bush on Fox News is the man's first cousin. The Coalition of the Willing includes Afghanistan. This is scary, scary stuff.
The second half gets personal, as Moore goes to Flint, Michigan and talks to a woman who has sent all of her children into the military, is proud of it, and sees her family as "the backbone of the country." When she finds out that her son is a casualty of the Iraq war, he visits with her again. Her near-collapse in Washington DC, as she tries to reconcile her pride and her fury, is heartbreaking, and sets up Moore's powerful final message -- that we have lost the trust of the people, mostly the poorer classes, who sacrifice their lives to fight for our freedom.
Is all of this cynical manipulation for political gain? Is Moore playing us like an organ, the same way the Bush administration played the American people? I don't know. Maybe. I'm too blinded by rage to be able to tell, and frankly I don't care. Right now, in the summer of 2004, Fahrenheit 9/11 is an absolute good.