2004/07/27

Okay, I've Seen It Now
'Fahrenheit 9/11' proved to be a bit of a treat. If anything Michael Moore is entertaining if somewhat ham-fisted. It makes for depressing viewing which ever camp you might be in with regards to the war in Iraq. I won't go into that part of it because well, you know my arguments and I don't have the energy to go 280 posts with James on the Left or Mr. Weasel on the Right, or both at once. Be that as it may, I will stick to my original assertion that this is not very different to Leni Riefenstahl plying her trade as a film maker, and I can happily live with any film maker doing so.

What's Good About It?
What is good about this film is that Michael Moore is less apparent in the material than in 'Bowling for Columbine'. Where as he came across as a smart-ass gonzo journalist in the earlier work, his reduced presence in this film allows the material he has assembled to speak for itself; and George W. Bush indeed talks a lot. What emerges from the cavalcade of documents and clippings, press footage and private footage assembled regarding George W Bush is that he really damns himself. It becomes exceedingly clear the man is heavily compromised by the interests he represents (not that this is great news or that another President wouldn't be... But it is what it is). While Moore does not spell it out, given the edited footage the only three possible explanations that can be drawn about the man are that he is either so dumb, or so crooked or both.

The amount of dogged pursuit of detail and data to assemble this film was no mean feat. I kid you not, this is a towering work of editor-ship and the kudos should go to the researchers as well as the three accredited editors. The sound work that must have been required to bring to the screen the some of the crappy source sounds must have been staggering. Indeed, the technical achievement of bringing to a cinema screen such diverse sources is mind-boggling and mesmeric. Believe me, technically speaking this film could not have happened even 5 years ago. It's even crisper than 'Bowling for Columbine' in its execution and technique.

It's also a good thing that we now have a public record of how the Bush family and the bin Laden family are related. Let's be blunt; the Bushes have been on the Bin Laden payroll for 30 years and more. The Bushes have benefited from the association more than what they have gotten from their time in public office. Fair crack of the whip, this should be known. What you infer from that is your own business.  

We also get a Congressman who admits he doesn't read everything, on the public record. That's got to be good. And also a telephone number to annoy somebody in Congress.

What's bad About It?
I understand Michael Moore is one-sided but quite often he misstates his case in order to over-state his case when objective facts might have done the trick. For instance, he bags out the Coalition of the Willing by citing the weaker members of the Coalition, almost laughing at the plight of these nations: Palau, Costa Rica Romania.
Palau has the back ground of some indigenous person living closer to naked than in a suit and tie.
Costa Rica shows a barefooted guy pulling a loaded rickshaw through a muddy jungle. 
Romania gets a few cuts of Dracula rising from a coffin, courtesy of the original Nosferatu (come on, Mike!. Like, is Ceaucescu back from the dead sucking on Iraqi blood or something?)
He also takes a quick swipe at Iceland by showing some old footage of a Viking movie and fails to mention the UK and well, us, Australia. (Yeah Mike, the Vikings are raiding the coast of Iraq with American approval!)
We get the picture that the US pretty much commandeered the agenda to invade Iraq (but we knew that already), but does Moore's case get stronger by not mentioning the UK, Poland and Australia while putting in bold the lesser contributors? The film is full of such bombastic hyperbole, one comes out of the cinema disoriented, trying to figure out what in the maelstrom of images and sounds is actually meant to argue exactly what.

And that's a problem. the through-argument of this film is totally un-clear. Is it that Bush is a crook? Or is it that Bush's family are crooks? Or is it that Bush and his entire admin is a bunch of crooks? Is it that the war is rort for Halliburton and the real crook is Cheney? Where was it all going? In the end it seemed like it was complaining that the Americans don't pay enough for the boys who tote the guns and do the dirty work of killing for us, which we don't want them to do anyway. As if that makes a whole lot of sense too.
Instead you walk out with this garbled mass of scattergun character assassinations.  

What also suffers is the fact that policy long term or short, never seems to enter Michael Moore's discourse. The film is a big nay-saying of the current US administration, which is fine and dandy. At the same time, it is not as if he is able to offer any vision of how US policy should have been or should be with regards to the likes of Taliban, Al Qaeda, or Saddam Hussein. Again, he overstates his case insanely by saying that Iraq was in no position to harm America or that it had never murdered an American.
Maybe that's enough for some, but I found it wanting.

And What Would It Matter?
So Michael Moore has made his political point. The masses have flocked to see what exactly the point is, only to fatten up the coffers of the already successful Mr. Moore. You'd think GWB was the best thing to have happened to Mike Moore. Will George W. Bush lose the election? By the sound of the opening 10 minutes I'd say that it wouldn't matter because Kerry and Edwards will mysteriously lose Florida, thanks to the electoral fraud perpetrated by the Bush clan.
Anyway, it's an interesting enough viewing experience. I probably wouldn't have given it a gong at Cannes, but I guess I wasn't there to argue it.

Watch it because it's topical, but I'd venture the use-by date on this film is a lot sooner than you think.

- Art Neuro

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Transcript of President Bush's first State of the Union address (2002), delivered to Congress Tuesday night.
Mr. Speaker, Vice President Cheney, members of Congress, distinguished guests, fellow citizens, as we gather tonight, our nation is at war, our economy is in recession and the civilized world faces unprecedented dangers. Yet the state of our union has never been stronger.
We last met in an hour of shock and suffering. In four short months, our nation has comforted the victims, begun to rebuild New York and the Pentagon, rallied a great coalition, captured, arrested and rid the world of thousands of terrorists, destroyed Afghanistan's terrorist training camps, saved a people from starvation and freed a country from brutal oppression.



The American flag flies again over our embassy in Kabul. Terrorists who once occupied Afghanistan now occupy cells at Guantanamo Bay. And terrorist leaders who urged followers to sacrifice their lives are running for their own.
America and Afghanistan are now allies against terror. We will be partners in rebuilding that country. And this evening we welcome the distinguished interim leader of a liberated Afghanistan: Chairman Hamid Karzai.
The last time we met in this chamber, the mothers and daughters of Afghanistan were captives in their own homes, forbidden from working or going to school.
Today women are free, and are part of Afghanistan's new government. And we welcome the new minister of women's affairs, Dr. Sima Samar.
Our progress is a tribute to the spirit of the Afghan people, to the resolve of our coalition and to the might of the United States military.
When I called our troops into action, I did so with complete confidence in their courage and skill. And tonight, thanks to them, we are winning the war on terror.
The men and women of our armed forces have delivered a message now clear to every enemy of the United States: Even 7,000 miles away, across oceans and continents, on mountaintops and in caves you will not escape the justice of this nation.
For many Americans, these four months have brought sorrow and pain that will never completely go away. Every day a retired firefighter returns to Ground Zero to feel closer to his two sons who died there. At a memorial in New York, a little boy left his football with a note for his lost father: "Dear Daddy, please take this to Heaven. I don't want to play football until I can play with you again someday." Last month, at the grave of her husband, Micheal, a CIA officer and Marine who died in Mazar-e Sharif, Shannon Spann said these words of farewell: "Semper fi, my love." Shannon is with us tonight.
Shannon, I assure you and all who have lost a loved one that our cause is just, and our country will never forget the debt we owe Micheal and all who gave their lives for freedom.
Our cause is just, and it continues. Our discoveries in Afghanistan confirmed our worst fears and showed us the true scope of the task ahead. We have seen the depth of our enemies' hatred in videos where they laugh about the loss of innocent life.
And the depth of their hatred is equaled by the madness of the destruction they design. We have found diagrams of American nuclear power plants and public water facilities, detailed instructions for making chemical weapons, surveillance maps of American cities, and thorough descriptions of landmarks in America and throughout the world.
What we have found in Afghanistan confirms that, far from ending there, our war against terror is only beginning. Most of the 19 men who hijacked planes on September the 11th were trained in Afghanistan's camps. And so were tens of thousands of others. Thousands of dangerous killers, schooled in the methods of murder, often supported by outlaw regimes, are now spread throughout the world like ticking time bombs, set to go off without warning.
Thanks to the work of our law enforcement officials and coalition partners, hundreds of terrorists have been arrested, yet tens of thousands of trained terrorists are still at large. These enemies view the entire world as a battlefield, and we must pursue them wherever they are. So long as training camps operate, so long as nations harbor terrorists, freedom is at risk and America and our allies must not, and will not, allow it.
Our nation will continue to be steadfast, and patient and persistent in the pursuit of two great objectives. First, we will shut down terrorist camps, disrupt terrorist plans and bring terrorists to justice. And second, we must prevent the terrorists and regimes who seek chemical, biological or nuclear weapons from threatening the United States and the world.
Our military has put the terror training camps of Afghanistan out of business, yet camps still exist in at least a dozen countries. A terrorist underworld -- including groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and Jaish-i-Mohammed -- operates in remote jungles and deserts, and hides in the centers of large cities.
While the most visible military action is in Afghanistan, America is acting elsewhere.
We now have troops in the Philippines helping to train that country's armed forces to go after terrorist cells that have executed an American and still hold hostages. Our soldiers, working with the Bosnian government, seized terrorists who were plotting to bomb our embassy. Our Navy is patrolling the coast of Africa to block the shipment of weapons and the establishment of terrorist camps in Somalia.
My hope is that all nations will heed our call and eliminate the terrorist parasites who threaten their countries and our own.
Many nations are acting forcefully. Pakistan is now cracking down on terror, and I admire the strong leadership of President Musharraf. But some governments will be timid in the face of terror. And make no mistake about it: If they do not act, America will.
Our second goal is to prevent regimes that sponsor terror from threatening America or our friends and allies with weapons of mass destruction.
Some of these regimes have been pretty quiet since September 11, but we know their true nature. North Korea is a regime arming with missiles and weapons of mass destruction, while starving its citizens.
Iran aggressively pursues these weapons and exports terror, while an unelected few repress the Iranian people's hope for freedom.
Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror. The Iraqi regime has plotted to develop anthrax and nerve gas and nuclear weapons for over a decade. This is a regime that has already used poison gas to murder thousands of its own citizens, leaving the bodies of mothers huddled over their dead children. This is a regime that agreed to international inspections then kicked out the inspectors. This is a regime that has something to hide from the civilized world.
States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger. They could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred. They could attack our allies or attempt to blackmail the United States. In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic.
We will work closely with our coalition to deny terrorists and their state sponsors the materials, technology and expertise to make and deliver weapons of mass destruction.
We will develop and deploy effective missile defenses to protect America and our allies from sudden attack.
And all nations should know: America will do what is necessary to ensure our nation's security.
We'll be deliberate, yet time is not on our side. I will not wait on events while dangers gather. I will not stand by as peril draws closer and closer. The United States of America will not permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons.
Our war on terror is well begun, but it is only begun. This campaign may not be finished on our watch, yet it must be and it will be waged on our watch.
We can't stop short. If we stopped now, leaving terror camps intact and terror states unchecked, our sense of security would be false and temporary. History has called America and our allies to action, and it is both our responsibility and our privilege to fight freedom's fight.
Our first priority must always be the security of our nation, and that will be reflected in the budget I send to Congress. My budget supports three great goals for America: We will win this war, we will protect our homeland, and we will revive our economy.
September 11 brought out the best in America and the best in this Congress, and I join the American people in applauding your unity and resolve. Now Americans deserve to have this same spirit directed toward addressing problems here at home.
I am a proud member of my party. Yet as we act to win the war, protect our people and create jobs in America, we must act first and foremost not as Republicans, not as Democrats, but as Americans.
It costs a lot to fight this war. We have spent more than a billion dollars a month -- over $30 million a day -- and we must be prepared for future operations. Afghanistan proved that expensive precision weapons defeat the enemy and spare innocent lives, and we need more of them. We need to replace aging aircraft and make our military more agile to put our troops anywhere in the world quickly and safely.
Our men and women in uniform deserve the best weapons, the best equipment and the best training and they also deserve another pay raise. My budget includes the largest increase in defense spending in two decades, because while the price of freedom and security is high, it is never too high. Whatever it costs to defend our country, we will pay.
The next priority of my budget is to do everything possible to protect our citizens and strengthen our nation against the ongoing threat of another attack.
Time and distance from the events of September the 11th will not make us safer unless we act on its lessons. America is no longer protected by vast oceans. We are protected from attack only by vigorous action abroad and increased vigilance at home.
My budget nearly doubles funding for a sustained strategy of homeland security, focused on four key areas: bioterrorism; emergency response; airport and border security; and improved intelligence.
We will develop vaccines to fight anthrax and other deadly diseases. We'll increase funding to help states and communities train and equip our heroic police and firefighters.
We will improve intelligence collection and sharing, expand patrols at our borders, strengthen the security of air travel, and use technology to track the arrivals and departures of visitors to the United States.
Homeland security will make America not only stronger but in many ways better. Knowledge gained from bioterrorism research will improve public health. Stronger police and fire departments will mean safer neighborhoods. Stricter border enforcement will help combat illegal drugs.
And as government works to better secure our homeland, America will continue to depend on the eyes and ears of alert citizens. A few days before Christmas, an airline flight attendant spotted a passenger lighting a match. The crew and passengers quickly subdued the man, who had been trained by al Qaeda and was armed with explosives. The people on that airplane were alert, and as a result likely saved nearly 200 lives. And tonight we welcome and thank flight attendants Hermis Moutardier and Christina Jones.
Once we have funded our national security and our homeland security, the final great priority of my budget is economic security for the American people. To achieve these great national objectives -- to win the war, protect the homeland and revitalize our economy -- our budget will run a deficit that will be small and short term so long as Congress restrains spending and acts in a fiscally responsible way.
Americans who have lost their jobs need our help, and I support extending unemployment benefits and direct assistance for health care coverage. Yet American workers want more than unemployment checks. They want a steady paycheck.
When America works, America prospers, so my economic security plan can be summed up in one word: jobs. Good jobs begin with good schools, and here we've made a fine start. Republicans and Democrats worked together to achieve historic education reform so that no child is left behind. I was proud to work with members of both parties, Chairman John Boehner and Congressman George Miller, Senator Judd Gregg. And I was so proud of our work I even had nice things to say about my friend Ted Kennedy.
There's more to do. We need to prepare our children to read and succeed in school with improved Head Start and early childhood development programs. We must upgrade our teacher colleges and teacher training and launch a major recruiting drive with a great goal for America: a quality teacher in every classroom.
Good jobs also depend on reliable and affordable energy. This Congress must act to encourage conservation, promote technology, build infrastructure, and it must act to increase energy production at home so America is less dependent on foreign oil.
Good jobs depend on expanded trade. Selling into new markets creates new jobs, so I ask Congress to finally approve trade promotion authority.
On these two key issues, trade and energy, the House of Representatives has acted to create jobs and I urge the Senate to pass this legislation.
Good jobs depend on sound tax policy. Last year, some in this hall thought my tax relief plan was too small, some thought it was too big. But when those checks arrived in the mail, most Americans thought tax relief was just about right.
Congress listened to the people and responded by reducing tax rates, doubling the child credit and ending the death tax. For the sake of long-term growth, and to help Americans plan for the future, let's make these tax cuts permanent.
The way out of this recession, the way to create jobs, is to grow the economy by encouraging investment in factories and equipment, and by speeding up tax relief so people have more money to spend. For the sake of American workers, let's pass a stimulus package. Good jobs must be the aim of welfare reform. As we reauthorize these important reforms, we must always remember: The goal is to reduce dependency on government and offer every American the dignity of a job.
Americans know economic security can vanish in an instant without health security. I ask Congress to join me this year to enact a Patients' Bill of Rights to give uninsured workers credits to help buy health coverage, to approve an historic increase in spending for veterans' health and to give seniors a sound and modern Medicare system that includes coverage for prescription drugs.
A good job job should lto security in retirement. I ask Congress to enact new safeguards for 401(k) and pension plans. Employees who have worked hard and saved all their lives should not have to risk losing everything if their company fails.
Through stricter accounting standards and tougher disclosure requirements, corporate America must be made more accountable to employees and shareholders and held to the highest standards of conduct.
Retirement security also depends upon keeping the commitments of Social Security, and we will. We must make Social Security financially stable and allow personal retirement accounts for younger workers who choose them.
Members, you and I will work together in the months ahead on other issues: productive farm policy, a cleaner environment, broader home ownership, especially among minorities and ways to encourage the good work of charities and faith-based groups.
I ask you to join me on these important domestic issues in the same spirit of cooperation we have applied to our war against terrorism.
During these last few months, I've been humbled and privileged to see the true character of this country in a time of testing. Our enemies believed America was weak and materialistic, that we would splinter in fear and selfishness. They were as wrong as they are evil. The American people have responded magnificently, with courage and compassion, strength and resolve. As I have met the heroes, hugged the families and looked into the tired faces of rescuers, I have stood in awe of the American people.
And I hope you will join me in expressing thanks to one American for the strength and calm and comfort she brings to our nation in crisis: our first lady, Laura Bush.
None of us would ever wish the evil that was done on September 11th, yet after America was attacked, it was as if our entire country looked into a mirror and saw our better selves. We were reminded that we are citizens, with obligations to each other, to our country and to history. We began to think less of the goods we can accumulate and more about the good we can do.
For too long our culture has said, "If it feels good, do it." Now America is embracing a new ethic and a new creed: "Let's roll." In the sacrifice of soldiers, the fierce brotherhood of firefighters, and the bravery and generosity of ordinary citizens, we have glimpsed what a new culture of responsibility could look like. We want to be a Nation that serves goals larger than self. We have been offered a unique opportunity, and we must not let this moment pass.
My call tonight is for every American to commit at least two years, 4,000 hours over the rest of your lifetime, to the service of your neighbors and your nation.
Many are already serving and I thank you. If you aren't sure how to help, I've got a good place to start. To sustain and extend the best that has emerged in America, I invite you to join the new USA Freedom Corps.
The Freedom Corps will focus on three areas of need: responding in case of crisis at home, rebuilding our communities, and extending American compassion throughout the world. One purpose of the USA Freedom Corps will be homeland security. America needs retired doctors and nurses who can be mobilized in major emergencies ... volunteers to help police and fire departments, transportation and utility workers well-trained in spotting danger.
Our country also needs citizens working to rebuild our communities. We need mentors to love children, especially children whose parents are in prison, and we need more talented teachers in troubled schools. USA Freedom Corps will expand and improve the good efforts of AmeriCorps and Senior Corps to recruit more than 200,000 new volunteers.
And America needs citizens to extend the compassion of our country to every part of the world. So we will renew the promise of the Peace Corps, double its volunteers over the next five years, and ask it to join a new effort to encourage development, and education, and opportunity in the Islamic world.
This time of adversity offers a unique moment of opportunity, a moment we must seize to change our culture. Through the gathering momentum of millions of acts of service and decency and kindness, I know: We can overcome evil with greater good.
And we have a great opportunity during this time of war to lead the world toward the values that will bring lasting peace. All fathers and mothers, in all societies, want their children to be educated and live free from poverty and violence. No people on Earth yearn to be oppressed, or aspire to servitude, or eagerly await the midnight knock of the secret police.
If anyone doubts this, let them look to Afghanistan, where the Islamic "street" greeted the fall of tyranny with song and celebration. Let the skeptics look to Islam's own rich history -- with its centuries of learning, and tolerance, and progress.
America will lead by defending liberty and justice because they are right and true and unchanging for all people everywhere. No nation owns these aspirations, and no nation is exempt from them. We have no intention of imposing our culture -- but America will always stand firm for the non-negotiable demands of human dignity: the rule of law ... limits on the power of the state ... respect for women ... private property ... free speech ... equal justice ... and religious tolerance.
America will take the side of brave men and women who advocate these values around the world -- including the Islamic world -- because we have a greater objective than eliminating threats and containing resentment. We seek a just and peaceful world beyond the war on terror.
In this moment of opportunity, a common danger is erasing old rivalries. America is working with Russia, China, and India in ways we never have before to achieve peace and prosperity. In every region, free markets and free trade and free societies are proving their power to lift lives. Together with friends and allies from Europe to Asia, from Africa to Latin America, we will demonstrate that the forces of terror cannot stop the momentum of freedom.
The last time I spoke here, I expressed the hope that life would return to normal. In some ways, it has. In others, it never will. Those of us who have lived through these challenging times have been changed by them. We've come to know truths that we will never question: Evil is real, and it must be opposed.
Beyond all differences of race or creed, we are one country, mourning together and facing danger together. Deep in the American character, there is honor, and it is stronger than cynicism. Many have discovered again that even in tragedy, especially in tragedy, God is near.
In a single instant, we realized that this will be a decisive decade in the history of liberty -- that we have been called to a unique role in human events. Rarely has the world faced a choice more clear or consequential.
Our enemies send other people's children on missions of suicide and murder. They embrace tyranny and death as a cause and a creed. We stand for a different choice -- made long ago, on the day of our founding. We affirm it again today. We choose freedom and the dignity of every life.
Steadfast in our purpose, we now press on. We have known freedom's price. We have shown freedom's power. And in this great conflict, my fellow Americans, we will see freedom's victory.
Thank you, thank you all, and may God bless.

2:14 pm
Art Neuro said...

Wow. George W Bush come sto my site to post personal retorts to Mike Moore, annonymously.
I feel touched. :)

5:45 pm
Jörel said...

Not having seen the movie, I cannot tell whether Bush is 'either so dumb or so crooked or both'. (Having watched CNN, BBC and French channels during the Iraq war, I have my guesses, though).
The first comment certainly convinced me that Bush delivers speeches of mindblowing pompousness. I'm amazed that they work. (Do they work?)

6:15 pm
Art Neuro said...

It was the State of the Union address. Whether it works or not, I think those things are meant to be grandiloquent to some, pompous to others. Somebody posted it up because they really wanted me to read it I guess. :)

Some people buy their news from the Left, some buy it from the Right, it always seems to come thtough AP or Reuters, and then some guy puts his dubious spin on it.
As films go, though, F9/11 is substantially above 'average/mediocre', but not really close to 'transcendent'.

10:31 pm

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