There is a tale of two documentaries happening here at TIFF this year. Michael Moore, a gifted thinker and showman, delivered the weakest documentary of his career. Capitalism: A Love Story is little more than one of Moore
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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
“the weakest documentary of his career.”
You’ve seen The Big One and Slacker Uprising, right?
I think you couldn’t be more wrong in characterizing the new one as “Republicans suck.” The guy who seems to me to get demonized the most in it is Chris Dodd, Democrat. “Corporatism sucks” would be more accurate.
Bush and Reagan are painted by the movie as empty suits; Dodd as a guy who is actively corrupt.
And I for one did not know about “Dead Peasant” policies, for example, before seeing it. But I’ll give you that its thesis is kind of all over the place.
im trying to figure out when Moore left anyone breathless, other than himself when he walked up a flight of stairs.
Moore documenteries have always been opinion pieces with facts manipulated to fit his own position on an issue.
Bowling for Columbine was such a strange piece. Trying to talk to Dick Clark because someone who lost their son to an accidental shooting because they were working at an American Bandstand themed restaurant.
That moment where he puts the picture of the little girl in Charlton Heston’s driveway. Such a corny and manipulative little moment.
Moore tries to take on icons. It made sense in Roger and Me. The guy he was after was directly responsible for the economic impact crippling his hometown.
But most of his films have shreds of a point or two before being unraveled to a ludicrous nature. His logic can be picked apart so easily. His success is actually a disservice to his work. Having to insert himself into every film as the comic foil to whatever institution he’s challenging. It makes his films now almost cartoonish. It erodes the seriousness of his message.
He’s like a political fatty arbuckle.
Ruppert is a lunatic, pure and simple.
I find it telling that Smith makes no real effort (per your review — “Smith throws the accusations that Ruppert is a wacko conspiracy theorist a few times in the course of the interview,” which sounds like they’re throwaway moments — haven’t seen the movie) to get more into Ruppert’s head and beliefs. As one of the most prominent 9/11 “Truthers” out there… I can’t listen to a word he has to say. If you’re willfully going to ignore OVERWHELMING scientific evidence, I have no need to waste my time listening to you.
David: if someone made a doc about a really compelling guy who argued that the moon landings were faked… would that make for a great movie? Would it get you thinking “Hey — I never believed the moon conspiracy theories before, but NOW I’m a believer… that guy seems to know what he’s talking about!” This is the same thing: a paranoid madman who’s convinced the world’s going to end, and that the government is part of the master plan.
Mind you, I am absolutely NOT saying we’re in great shape on ol’ planet earth. I’d LIKE to see a cogent, SCIENTIFIC explanation for how we’re harming the planet, because I DO believe that we’re doing so. But picking Michael Ruppert as your messenger is hackery, pure and simple.
What’s next, praise for Orly Taitz and the Birther movement? Come on, David!
Moore is a genuinely talented filmmaker who, as I was telling my class the other day, elevated documentary filmmaking to another level. His use of ironic pop music, clips from other sources and cross cutting for comic effect is unlike any other. Roger & Me is one of the best comedies of the 80’s and I own it and it always makes me laugh.
But that was 89. In 2009, listening to Moore, a millionaire filmmaker and Hollywood insider who uses private health care and private education lecture about the horrors of America and capitalism and the joys of communism and Marxism is kind of like listening to Jim and Tammy Faye Baker lecture about the horrors of sex and money in the 80’s while they were getting drunk on it.
Moore does what Moore does because it is his schtick. At this point I have no idea if he really believes what he believes or if it his just his caharacter he sells to 60’s burnouts and wealthy white college students who buy into it full bore.
Is he smart? Dunno. Certainly a brilliant showman and creator of packaged controvery that the media does not question him on. If he really believes his own message that communism/Marxism is the answer than he might be one of the stupider people on the planet.
I have no idea.
“What’s next, praise for Orly Taitz and the Birther movement?”
Exactly. But he birther movement people would never get this close to having a film made about their views. The fact that the Smith film is getting so praised says much about what the left really believes.
I’d rather hear conservatives lecture on War, Jesus and Capitalism.
As usual, Nicol, you’re talking about the ‘left’ as a massive, monolithic entity when you would take great pains to describe the ‘right’ as a complex, multifaceted set of players.
“If he really believes his own message that communism/Marxism is the answer”
That’s not what he says in the movie.
I heard Moore this morning on the local NPR station here and disagree with what Nicol wrote. This new movie really does point out the disparity between the rich and poor (well, from what he explained anyway, I haven’t seen it yet)and tries to couch it ina way to fire up the everyman. It may fail as David said, but Moore does raise valid points about how those who make less than $110,000 a year pay more in taxes than those who make more. Which is definitely Moore’s tax bracket.
Getting on the guys case for preaching to the liberals while on a pedestal made of his millions is such a lame, played out attack. Yeah, he’s rich. He still seems to want people to be treated fairly which I’m all for no matter who’s tooting that horn.
Moore also said he may be done with docs if this one doesn’t inspire change. He’s likely looking for an excuse to move away from docs and into fictional narratives, but still. That’s his pitch right now.
As soon as Jeff Wells raved about the Moore doc, I knew I had no interest. Moore is a blowhard and nothing more.
You’re a Morlock!
Nicol, have you seen Collapse? I never even heard of it until I read this post. Yet somehow the good reviews it’s getting (how many can there possibly be?) sums up what “the left” believes? I know you mean that in a disparaging way, but since I haven’t seen it I don’t even know what exactly you mean. Just that once again you’re making a nuanced, thoughtful and totally fair statement when you write “the left.” Obviously An American Carol and Expelled speak for every single person right-of-center. Bunch of creationist America-haters, the lot of them!
Don’t you mean a Moore-lock?
I find Wells’ whole ‘Morlock/Eloi’ thing stupid and ridiculous. Which one is supposed to be good and which one is supposed to be bad? I don’t think he really understands this very simple (yet not simple) differentiation, that both are ultimately undesireable. Eloi are the pampered elite who don’t understand the true nature of their existences, Morlocks are hideous monster who feast on Eloi flesh. Whichever one Wells thinks he is, he’s right.
My impression is Wells thinks he’s the Time Traveler, who fights the Morlocks and shakes the Eloi out of their complacency. He uses both terms derisively.
Wells is so clearly bereft of sense and sensibility that it’s pointless to suss him out. His site is the blog equivalent of battered wives syndrome.
No, I think Wells means the Eloi to be the dumbass kids who line up to see any old piece of shit as long as it’s got plenty of explosions, robots or hot babes, and the Morlocks to be the evil studio people who keep shoveling this rubbish out.