His Oscar in one hand...

[evenwolf]

So today, everyone's favorite political commentator Michael Moore held a speech at the University of Texas here in Austin.  He spoke of the oscar incident, and he even had the trophy there to pass through the audience in a very casual, hilarious way.  He did his normal "schtick" similar to what he said on the Rolling Thunder Tour last year, and he commented on the war as you can imagine.  But all that aside- I have to get this out there, you people must know:

When the speech was over, all questions asked and time out, hundreds of people swarmed the stage to get autographs on their programs or books.  My friend and I had this plan but thought it would be hopeless to reach him.  However, at one point he swept down the stage so everyone could touch the oscar and in my time of glory I did what I had to.

Let's just say that tonight- Michael Moore left the stage with his oscar in one hand, and my short movie "Military Force" in the other.  My friend and I shared many laughs during the walk home.

[Las Naranjas]

Hurrah for Jesse!

[Dmitri]

Haha Even! Way to get noticed

Good job, here's hoping for the future!

[n3tgraph]

? eh? Did I miss something?

Who is Michael Moore?

[Trapezoid]

I'm not sure, but he seems to have something against fictition.

[Las Naranjas]

American social activist, won an oscar for Bowling For Columbine which became the largest grossing documentary ever in many countries. Wrote Stupid White Men which sold out on the first day, and sold out over 5 reprints in the first week, despite concerted efforts by the publisher to bury the book, and many many other things.

His immense popularity shows that Americans aren't as apathetic as we think they are.

[Barcik]

Hope it gets something for you...

[evenwolf]

Well Michael is known for helping young filmmakers out.  However, the film I handed him was one random junket of visual and audio experience.   Haha, it was a short my friends and I filmed over a weekend and it included staged gay porn between Robert E. Lee and Alexander the Great.  And a random fight sequence.  Ah, it's great and I laugh like hell when I think about it. One day I'll post a download.

[juncmodule]

Michael Moore is from my home town, Flint, Michigan. He made the movie "Roger and Me" where he pursued the president of GM to confront him about the loss of jobs in Flint.

I'm really happy to see Michael's success. Nice to see that I'm not the only person that made it out of that town. I still have a lot of family that live there. Not a pretty place. The economy just doesn't exist anymore. GM closed Buick City a few years ago, which was once the largest auto plant in the US, and now there are either thousands of people unemployed, under employed, or that have just left the city.

later,
-junc

[DGMacphee]

Last week, I finished reading "Downsize This!", which he wrote just after Roger & Me.

I recommend it very much!

[visitor]

Some of you might want to read this :

http://www.hardylaw.net/Truth_About_Bowling.html

[evenwolf]

basically, the argument you are presenting is that Moore edited the movie. What a naughty thing for him to do..  

[Simple]

I read up to the bit about the NRA.

Whoever wrote this article didn't pay very close attention to the movie.  The fact is that Michael Moore allowed the people he interviewed to reveal themselves for what they really were.

Was I the only one who felt very sorry for Tim McVey's brother when he was interviewed, saying how his life had changed because of Tim's action and how everybody thinks he's a psychopath now?  Michael Moore LETS us feel pity for him..and then lets him demonstrate (on his own) that yes, he is indeed a psychopath.  If anything, Moore misleads us into pitying the man at first!

But about the NRA...it says the Bowling for Columbine made it appear that Heston and the rest RUSHED to Littleton after the tragedy, when actually it was an event scheduled very far in the past.

Well...the movie isn't misleading.  The movie said SPECIFICALLY that it was pre-scheduled, and Moore's gripe about callousness came about them not rescheduling or moving the meeting.

The film wasn't misleading...somebody should write an essay about how this essay was misleading.

[evenwolf]

"Australia: Bowling says 65. This is very close, albeit picking the year to get the data desired. Between 1980-1995, firearm homicides varied from 64-123, although never exactly 65. In 2000, it was 64, which was proudly proclaimed as the lowest number in the country's history. If suicides and accidents are included, the numbers become 516 - 687."

Haha, tell me this guy isn't being nit picky in the slightest.

[Butcher]

I love Michael Moore.

This article is a piece of crap

congrats Evenwolf! I'm very proud of you!

I've only seen bowling for columbine and The Big One, but I can't seem to find any European DVDs of his other works...pity

[Simple]

I also love how he points out that the devious Michael Moore edited out Charlton Heston's comments that there would be fewer festivities at the Littleton meeting, which some people might find confusing.

What a cad!

Obviously Heston cancelling his "pin the buckshot on the deer" competition makes things a lot better.

What people need to realize is that Moore's film is just that--a film.  He can't include absolutely everything if he's going to have it fit into a 2 hr block.  Cuts are made for the sake of brevity, relevance, and clarity.

And if that means excising something insignificant in the middle of somebody speech...so be it.

[Andail]

Visitor: It's hard to take people seriously if they go anonymous as they post.
Especially when they don't have a point

[m0ds]

Sounds cool, but personally I thought he'd have one hand in his pocket and the other lighting a cigarette.

m0ds

[Las Naranjas]

So really, that article tells us that Moore does what every piece of popular media does. He's a populist, so of course he does all those things, just like every paper and News Channel does to beat the drum of the other side.

At least he dosen't pretend to be non biased. If he was to stick to strict academic writing, no-one would see it except converted intellectuals and pseudos, and Moore's seeking to make change in the greater pool of public opinion which dosen't access that. If he didn't provide the populist alternative, they'd just get what Fox News tells them.


But the growing number of hatchet jobs on him shows that he is having success. And they can't bludgeon him with the usual stereotype of the latté drinking middle class liberal.

[DGMacphee]

I like the fact that it adds in the gun-related suicides in Australia.

Considering we have the highest suicide rate in the world.

At least we're ot killing each other -- just ourselves.

What a wonderful world!


Edit: I just read that RevoketheOscar.com page.

I was interested to read the opening blurb:

Bowling for Columbine is a nasty bit of anti-American propaganda. Viewers are taught that:

America was founded on violence and fear, as quarrelsome pilgrims fled to the new world, where their paranoia led them to massacre the Indians, then the British, and then each other;

Well how exactly did most of all those American Indians die?

Must have been floods or locusts.

The Columbine murderers' violence might have its roots in the fact that one had a father in our military (American soldiers are presumably murderers, and it must rub off on their kids) or that there was a defense contractor in the area;

The ol' Lockheed-Martin point.

Many say they only build rockets for launching satellites.

Then again, who knows what other pies they go their fingers in.

Business (in any country) is always a very hidden affair.

Charlton Heston (one of Hollywood's few upstanding men) is a callous fool;

I only half agree with this point.

Heston was a active campaigner for civil rights in the 60s.

He even marched with Martin Luther King.

He was awarded a Jean Hersholt humanitarian Oscar in 1977.

This point Moore omits in his doco.

However, oore does not call Heston a racist (as the essay says) or a fool (as the RevokeTheOscar sit says) -- he lets us make our minds up over the interview.

And despite Heston's work in the 60s, one has to wonder his current standing in the NRA -- he says he's exercising his constitutional rights.

However, at what point do constitution rights affect basic human rights (especially the right to live).

The terrorist attack on 9/11 is related to past American foreign policy -- in short, America's own fault;

Umm -- they were and it was, doofus!

I could go on for hours how Sept 11 was linked to American foreign policy and how it was their own fault -- but only if you're THAT desperate to privately post me and ask.

But this post is long enough now.



Whatever the case, I think all the controversy over Moore doco is just pedantic nitpicking.

The doco still raises far greater questions on a global scale than any other doco released that year.

Any statistic can be scewered any which way to push your own point of view across -- I've done it many times in the past.

Moore's doco questions a facet of the US -- it's something that doesn't happen very often in this fast-paced, profit-driven, give-the-people-what-they-want, media circus world of ours.

I'm glad Moore continues to write and make films -- his opinion may be unpopular, but that's what I like it.

It's an alternative.