Moore & Me

For years I would hear things from my mom about the crazy and immoral Michael Moore.  I never actually saw one of his movies, but when you're a kid you tend to share the opinions of your parents.  So when I found out that we were watching one of his documentaries in American Studies I was pretty excited.  I found myself enjoying the movie immensely, you have to admit it's very persuasive, not to mention entertaining.  But I couldn't help feeling a little manipulated by Moore.  It kind of felt like he was twisting this story to make a point of his own.  It's brilliant filmmaking, but when Mr. Lawler said that he actually did get an interview with Roger, I felt a little cheated.

In an article from Canada.com telling about a documentary about Moore I found out some things that tainted my image of him even moore (haha pun).  It turns out the guy' not even from Flint! This really made me upset.  He has used the false information that he was a resident of Flint to make us feel sympathetic for him.  As he was getting upset at the destruction of Flint so were we because we were seeing it from his point of view.  It also tells us about the fact that he did interview Roger Smith and that us just decided not to use it because it would create a stronger argument for him and garner some sympathy from the audience.

One of the parts that really made me mad was when I found out that the whole news van being stolen part was completely staged.  A documentary should not be tampered like that.  It's supposed to be all true, not based on truth.  It's almost the Stephen Fry effect.  At what point do you call it fiction?  

The article makes a good point.  Documentaries are supposed to have all the facts, good and bad, black and white, positive and negative, so that the audience can decide for themselves.  When Moore makes up facts he is giving us no choice but to agree with him.  It makes for a good movie, but not for a good documentary.