Michael Moore's Farenheit 911 is official Cannes Selection

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emmaloubeeee

New member
His latest documentary is the second ever documentary to get an official selection in Cannes (the last one was his too).

I hope that indicates it's as good as BFC.

He's not my hero or anything but there are certain things people need to know and he puts them up there.

Schooly
 
You're tired after 3 posts? Pfft. And no, you're probably right, there isn't such a thing as completely objective journalism, but there is definitely such a thing as holding back information in order to fool the morons who are too lazy to question what you're saying.




Yes, and I've already made that point, however there's a difference between coming at something with your own slant and holding back the truth, or quite simply making things up to suit that agenda.



Another thing followers of Michael Moore do too much is assume that anyone who doesn't like him belongs to the right... Hate to break it to you mate, there's plenty of good Liberal writers who can't stand the man.

I've given you a link to pages worth of untruths, lies, and ignorance. Some of that stuff is quite simply preposterous.





Well, firstly I'm not American, so why I'd be a reason America get's ridiculed is beyond me. And I don't just call him a liar, I call him a disingenuous fat git. And I'm not the only one...




Is that a lie? Or can the guy just not read?
 
'Bowling for Columbine' was one of my favourite films of last year (Jan 2003 was when I actually watched it else, even though it was released in 2002). I think that Farenheit 911 will provide more of the same.

Documentary is a bit of a 'hot topic' in film at the moment; just hope that they try to retain the style of his previous film and not revert to the blandness of 'Roger and Me'.
 
Riiiiiiiight.........so Intel are also manuafacturers of weapons of mass destruction?????

I would suggest that someone else neeRAB to consider the strength of their arguments. Which appear to be consist of saying that because somewhere there are bad people the entire organisation is bad.

Do Moore's aims of exposing the contradictions of the American Industrial-Military machine and its impact on politics and society justify demagogery and half truths?

My opinion is NO

Even though I have some sympathy for his views his methoRAB leave a bad taste in the mouth. Because it justifies the jingoistic rubbish which comes out of Fox News and others.
 
As someone new to this forum, I've read the back and forth between Emma WroiRAB and others here, and thought I would offer this:

The weblinks offered to support the assertion that Moore habitually "lies" in his work don't make that charge stick. They document that Moore heavily edits what he depicts, in ways that can be deceiving about the complete and precise nature of specific images or events he depicts. But they do not document that he affirmatively lies, or undermine the claim that he forcefully communicates important truths that the targets of his work cannot easily ignore.

Anyone who strives to persuade a mass audience has to constantly balance the desire to be complete (with appropriate disclaimers, caveats, qualifications, clear statements of assumptions that could be wrong, etc.) with the desire to be effective (people will only read so much, will only watch for so long, etc.).

Emma WroiRAB wrote: "Some of these sites do not dedicate themselves to being critical of Michael Moore, but just critical of bullshit in general."

This is true. But that doesn't make them reliable. Bullshit-busters have a habit of focusing on relatively trivial points as a way of attempting to discredit the entirely of a target's work.

As an example, the first weblink offered by Emma WroiRAB contains the (true) assertion that the NRA could not legally have moved its meeting from Denver following the Columbine shooting within the time between that shooting and the (previously scheduled) meeting, which is a point not acknowledged in Moore's film. But that weblink fails to note that the NRA could legally have postponed its meeting, and used mass media to notify its members about the postponement, buying it more time to notify members about a new location.

Thus, the weblink creates an impression -- through omission -- that is itself deceptive (that the NRA was legally prohibited from doing anything except what it did).

More importantly, it fails to effectively undermine Moore's basic point in that segment of his film: that the NRA is indifferent to the impact that guns have on victims of shootings, and it is indifferent to the desires of specific family members of victims. It is, after all, a large advocacy organization that is dedicated, openly, to preventing *any* effective regulation of gun ownership and use in the US. Moore's film dramatically presents an important truth (the NRA's indifference), and nothing in the weblink's critique undermines the importance of that truth.
 
haha, I have to agree with that. If it's too hot for Heston, he should get out of the kitchen. Gun control is such a complicated and derisive issue, he's got no business posing as the NRA's figure head if he can't handle hard hitting interviews.
 
Important truths? Like the Lockheed Martin factory near Columbine making "weapons of mass destruction"? The important truth is that they make space launch vehicles for TV satellites.

Or asking the question "Do you think it's a little dangerous handing out guns at a bank?" when the important truth is that the entire scene was staged, and you have to open long-term CRAB, and go to a gun store to get the gun after a background check



Spinsanity is a very highly regarded site with good, usually reliable writers. Some points are trivial, some points clearly aren't.



Well I'm not so sure about that. And I doubt anyone who came out of Bowling For Columbine really knows what the NRA stand for. Perhaps it would have been a lot more helpful to the issue, if Moore had interviewed Wayne LaPierre instead of attacking a man with alzheimer's. LaPierre is the head as far as the purposes of media interviews go, and would have given a far more interesting argument on what is undeniably a very complex issue. But Moore seemed to be more interested in making Heston look a fool than he did the complexity of the issue. That's where the film really fails for me.

One reviewer wrote...



He also wrote...
 
Can't say I'm a fan... Whilst all documentarians obviously have their own agenda, Moore seems to have no problem telling the most blatant lies and mis-truths, whilst accusing everyone else of being liars.
 
Swapping one extreme view for another perhaps? Not a 'dig' at anyone, just pointing it out...



ROFL :D Which perhaps makes it even more worrying that an illegal arms purchase can be made so easily over the counter at your (not so) local wallmart :D
 
If we're going to lard up things with extended quotes from other websites, here's Moore's response re the charge that the Littleton Lockheed site doesn't make WMD:

"Lockheed Martin is the largest weapons-maker in the world. The Littleton facility has been manufacturing missiles, missile components, and other weapons systems for almost half a century. In the 50s, workers at the Littleton facility constructed the first Titan intercontinental ballistic missile, designed to unleash a nuclear warhead on the Soviet Union; in the mid-80s, they were partially assembling MX missiles, instruments for the minuteman ICBM, a space laser weapon called Zenith Star, and a Star Wars program known as Brilliant Pebbles.

"In the full, unedited interview I did with the Lockheed spokesman, he told me that Lockheed started building nuclear missiles in Littleton and 'played a role in the development of Peacekeeper MX Missiles.'

"As for what's currently manufactured in Littleton, McCollum told me, 'They (the rockets sitting behind him) carry mainly very large national security satellites, some we can't talk about.' ...

"Since that interview, the Titan IV rockets manufactured in Littleton have been critical to the war effort in both Afghanistan and Iraq. These rockets launched advanced satellites that were "instrumental in providing command-and-control operations over Iraq...for the rapid targeting of Navy Tomahawk cruise missiles involved in Iraqi strikes and clandestine communications with Special Operations Forces." (view source here).

"That Lockheed lets the occasional weather or TV satellite hitch a ride on one of its rockets should not distract anyone from Lockheed's main mission and moneymaker in Littleton: to make instruments that help kill people. That two of Littleton's children decided to engineer their own mass killing is what these guys and the Internet crazies don't want to discuss."

See http://www.michaelmoore.com/worRAB/wackoattacko/
 
Thanks to jcciv for a good investigation....

The problem for Emma WroiRAB is that she fails to see the weaknesses of the material she supports herself on, and are thus committing the exact same errors that she is accusing Michael Moore for....
 
Nice of you to hold MY opinion in such high regard, thanks ;)

That is besides the point though. The purpose of such investigation is to give good sources to form an opinion for those who still believe in democracy. Between investigating comittees, and a free unbiased media (not so easy to find in american corporate media today), we could have a good chance to make a solid foundation for having an opinion.

For those who are interested in serious alternative sources to knowledge about american society I would like to suggest http://www.radiopower.org (no Michael Moore there though)
archives can be found at: http://www.whiterosesociety.org/
My favorite there is The Thom Hartmann Show, and he has also written many important books that can be found at amazon and other places.
 
So, to you this is a question of the individual soldier, eh?
How do you think the pictures got out of Iraq? Some soldiers thinking it was time to f*** up their own lifes?

Get real! The "softening" of prisoners are ordered by officers. The pictures that comes out are procuced by good soldiers, not able to take part in an evuil system no more....

Do you understand now?



So, where do YOU get your facts from? Have you ever concidered the idea that everybody you trust will prove to have been fabricating lies, and that everything Michael Moore have said was true after all. If you don't see how that is possible, then you should at least realize that you could be an easy target for manipulation.

When you judge someone for being liars, it would be customary to have water tight proof of this. If you don't then you are at big risk og being a liar yourself....played like a pawn... understand?



Of course he is guilty.... if he knows what his employer is doing, he can endorse it or quit working for him/her.

If YOU produced microchips, and then sold those to Bin Laden. Do you think Mr W, would let you aff the hook, eh?
 
at the end of the day, the whole point to BFC was to address the fact that there is far more gun related crime in the US than, well, pretty much anywhere, and as such something should really be done about it.

i don't feel I was decieved into believing this when it isn't true, as clearly it is.

Iain
 
Lockheed Martin derives 78% of its revenues from the US Government; its most profitable, largest, and fastest growing lines of business are sales of combat aircraft and other arms programs. (All this straight from their annual report, filed with the SEC on Form 10-K.) To suggest, as you do, that Lockheed's commercial (non-military) satellite businesses are more important is, frankly, precisely the type of deception for which Moore is being attacked.

Also, the idea that most viewers of Bowling don't know that the NRA opposes gun regulation is ridiculous. To suggest that the NRA's position on gun regulation -- none is good, ever -- involves complex or difficult issues is equally silly. The complex and difficult issues on gun control are ones the NRA never engages, and to interview its PR hack on the subject would add almost nothing to public discourse -- since the NRA is already spending millions of their members' dollars putting its views out.
 
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