Fahrenheit 9/11

I saw this film with my 13-year-old son on Thursday, and came away profoundly moved by it. Moore's observations about the contradictions in our American culture and the shortcomings of our leaders have always been provocative, if sometimes shrill. He sees an enormous gap between our leaders and their (often questionable) values on the one hand and the values and interests of the average typical right-thinking American on the other hand, and it fills him with outrage - a point of view I happen to share. He sees America as a land run by stupid white guys whose thoughtless greed has victimized countless hapless others. In his current film, Moore has found a very specific target for his outrage, and it's hard to imagine any sentient being coming away from this film not seething over the actions of our President and his cronies. But along with the anger, I came away with powerful feelings of grief and fear - grief for the people who have died (young Americans and Iraqi citizens of all ages) needlessly, and fear for our future and the future of our children. The last thing I want is to see my two bright sons and my bright young students drafted and put in harm's way to fight a meaningless war. Moore's film is provocative, eloquent and brave. Here's hoping it can influence some hearts and minds to unseat the current regime this fall.
I have to say, with regard to an earlier post in which I linked to an op-ed piece in the Toronto Star about the link between Assassins and Fahrenheit 9/11, that the connection between them is pretty slight. The musical Assassins does not actually call into question the actions of our leaders - in fact, it reveals that the men and women who have tried to murder a President seldom have a LOGICAL reason for their actions. The musical shows that the assassins' crimes were chiefly motivated by a psychotically inflamed sense of entitlement ("Everybody's got the right to their dreams") coupled with powerful feelings of powerlessness ("If you can't do what you want to, then you do the things you can.") Yes, their murders were heinous crimes, but the musical urges us to understand how the reasons behind their crimes reflects something unhealthy in the American personality.
Moore, on the other hand, rightly calls the actions of certain individuals into question, and sees their behavior as contradictory to basic American decency and fairness. The villians in Fahrenheit 9/11 look far more heinous to me than the villians in the musical Assassins - how's that for irony?
If you've never been there, take a visit to Michael Moore's website to read more about the response to his newest film and his ongoing efforts as an artist and concerned citizen to bring about positive social action.