| Objective: The purpose of this albeit brief email discussion will be to discuss issues related to the continued sucess of Michael Moore's "Ferenheit 9/11" at Cannes. Although neither of us have seen his film, it provides a good starting point for us to discuss some of the debates inherent to documentary film-making.
Round 1:
David: It is my assertion that Michael Moore is an irresponsible filmmaker who is doing far more harm than good. His filmmaking in manipulative in the worst way and exploits people's deepest fears. The real question we need to ask ourselves is whether documentary filmmakers have a responsibility to the audience to present their arguments in a factual manner. Well, the truth is that I think it depends on the type of filmmaking. In Michael Moore's case he presents his arguments in a factual manner. He pretends to use facts and figures to make an argument that is really just a not-so-cleverly-disguised attempt to make the audience cry. This is not responsible art. Documentary filmmaking in particular must either decide whether to present fact or fiction. Walking the fine line in between in not acceptable.
Steve: I'm not quite sure what other kind of cinema there is. Every single film, whether documentary, historical fiction, experimental or dramatic is a subjective experience, and almost all of them pretend to be objective. Take a scene from, oh, "Saving Private Ryan." Is this not deceiving the audience in hopes of making them cry? Presenting fiction as fact, and interpretation as reality. In truth, the very act of framing a shot makes a film subjective. It is presenting its world as a reality, but then makes an editorial decision in where to cut that world off. So for me, the real question when it comes to Moore's film is not whether he is being truthful, but if he is being responsible. He does not present his documentaries as fact. In fact, he goes so far as to appear in the shot - which is something most conventional documentary filmmakers would never do. He draws attention to the fact that this is his opinion, and his thesis. He is contructing an argument. Accordingly, "Bowling For Columbine" is not The Truth Behind American Violence, but rather Michael Moore's Investigation Into American Violence. This is a very big difference. We see his slant, his angle, his personality and his opinion. We know it is through him, and as such it is a responsible work. Only after we have established this are we able to get to the more important issues of personal vision, entertainment, enlightenment, and meaning. But to say that this does not deserve to be made is foolish. Must I cite all of the "narrative" films that pigeon-hole women and minorities. Those are the irresponsible works.
Round 2:
David: "his slant, his angle, his personality and his opinion." are very different things than presenting fiction under the auspices of fact. President Bush telling Congress he believes that Iraq is a threat to America and telling them that Iraq could launch WMD's in 45 minutes are very different things. Hitler believing Germans are descended from the Lost City of Atlantis and therefore a superior race, and Hitler threatening scientists to make the claim that the above belief is indeed fact are very different things.
While Moore may obviously have a slant, I contend that he intends to portray the films as a factual, intellectual discusion. This is on the same order as a teacher telling you the earth is flat. (To give you some fuel, this is on the same order as teaching religon in science class)
You would think it was absolutely absurd if anyone had used "Saving Private Ryan" in a factual intellectual discussion. Yet Michael Moore's films are used all the time. He's using his emotional drivel to bypass people's intellectual brain and plant facts in there. This is irresponsible. Not just as a film maker, but as a person. His films only serve to weaken his causes because his facts are so second rate.
Any skeptical viewer will probably double check his facts and see that most of his figures are made up at best. Then when these facts are used in an intellectual discussion they are utterly worthless.
If he wants to make fiction he should make fiction, then he should make fiction. Yet he has refused to repeatedly. I suspect the reason is because he realizes that without the audience accepting what he puts on film as something that has really happened in the context he presents, his films will fall flat.
It is this fact that I take so much offense to. "Saving Private Ryan" is emotionally manipulative, but going into it everyone is aware that this is fiction. Michael Moore's films are presented not simply with a slant, but
inaccurately.
Of course it doesn't deserve to be made. It propagates our continued lack of reliance on fact. He's no better than tabloid magazines, Presidential speeches, CIA intelligence, blindly patriotic Americans, car commercials and Nazi propaganda. If I felt for a minute that he was doing this because he so strongly believed what he makes I might forgive him, but his only goal seems to be to create ticket sales through controversy.
Steve: Perhaps you did not read my prior response. Every film is fiction. Every single one. No films present the truth, and very few claim to.
I find some of your comments very interesting, however. Can't you see that "Saving Private Ryan" (which has incidentally been cited in academic circles as the most accurate recreation of D-Day ever) is MORE manipulative than Moore's films exactly because it conceals its modes? If we saw the screenwriter and the props and the cameras, then it would be an honest experience. At least in Moore's work, he is willing to stand out there, be the film's narrator and link it to his personality.
Let me tell you what WOULD be deceiving: If this was a Michael Moore film, but it was narrated by a journalist, with professional photography and professional interviews. If it was given the glossed-over look of the New York Times or ABC News, and presented as fact.
But Moore does not do that. He shows his hand. He shows his bias. And this is the equivalent of an opinions column, not a news report.
He is trying to start the conversation, not end it, unlike most fiction films which ask you to suspend your disbelief. Moore wants you to clap, boo, become europhic or get pissed. He wants to be provocative about provocative subjects.
Personally, in a time when I feel the media isn't asking nearly a quarter of the questions it should be, I'm glad to see a filmmaker with the guts to push forward something so provocative.
Round 3:
David: I read your arguments. I simply completely disagree with them. Art, and film as one of the most popular arms of art, must be dedicated to the presuit of some universal truth. Otherwise it's worthless. It's just sensory masterbation.
"Saving Private Ryan" never claims that it's story is truthful, but it does claim to go after universal truths about the human struggle of war. Michael Moore's universal truths are facts.
That's the problem. It's not like Michael Moore interviews people and records events and then comments on them. He changes the events by participating in them and changing them.
I want to setup a scene in a documentary and I want you to tell me if it's irresponsible or not. A film maker shows a corporate exectutive depositing a check into the bank for $1,000,000. The next shot is of a group of workers opening a letter that their pension fund has dried up. Is this wrong in a documentary?
Now assume that the two events are totally unrelated. The two events occured on opposite ends of the country. In fact, the corporate executive had nothing to do with the company who had cut pensions, but was instead depositing a check into a corporate account to buy a new factory.
In this case it is very wrong. The film maker is taking non-fiction and splicing it together to create fiction. Yet because the images themselves are non-fiction, the audience immediately assumes that the film itself is non-fiction. Regardless of the slant the film maker might have, these events are percieved to be an event that actually occured and was not created in it's entirety by Moore himself.
There are pleanty of factual and real life examples to support all of Moore's points, but he continues to rely on emotionally charged meaningless moments to prop up his arguments.
Steve: Alrighty, let's take a few other movie moments. A child is shown dying. A child is showing being torn from her mother's arms. A sinister man lurks in the corner, his face blocked out by light. A camera cuts between two lovers standing apart, then their faces, and then their eyes and then their lips.
All of cinema is creating an illusion and a spectacle. The fact that there is no movement - only 24 frames running through a projector second - is the most duplicitous aspect of the medium.
If you are saying that every film must seek out universal truth, than you must be the most depressed moviegoer in the history of the world. The emergence of human truths is the rare case, the oddity, not the norm. Most movies are made to entertain or pacify. This is expressly why I enjoy Moore's films, although I agree with few of his sentiments.
The scenario you described I do not remember happening in a Moore film. What he does is what any wise columnist does - choose the arguments and stories and tangeants that suit his argument, sprinkling in the thoughts of the opposition from time to time. Those are his films.
You do realize he's making films about controversial subjects, right? What "universal truth" is he supposed to expose here? The truth you agree with? Because there is no "truth" to be found. Only arguments to be made and debates to encourage.
I'm assuming you would then cast every documentary as irrelevant, because every documentary distorts to its own purposes. The interviewer only asks certain questions, only includes certain answers and certain phrases, edits it together with music and other imagery and chooses how the subject is depicted in the frame. How is this any less manipulative than Moore?
I think your problem is with the moviegoer, not the moviemaker. Just because people are stupid, accept anything they are shown and ure unable to realize biases for themselves does not mean that Moore is a deceptive man. He makes his argument, and he tries to make it entertaining. I have not caught him lying yet, although I have caught him conveniently leaving things out.
But that's life, my friend. You do not read the opinions page of the newspaper for complete fact. And, if you're going to talk about the greater role of cinema, I would remind you again that the medium's endless attempts to conceal its artifice is the most manipulative aspect of the medium
Yes, "Saving Private Ryan" is more manipulative than "Bowling For Columbine." More dishonest, deceiving and artificial. That does not mean it can't be art.
Let's just get our stories straight.
CONCLUSION
David: I think you met my objections best when he stated, “The scenario you described I do not remember happening in a Moore film.” By your logic why should my lack of accuracy matter? This is after all an opinion column of my own creation. You are well aware of my bias and my writing is simply the result of my failed memory, so why shouldn’t I be allowed to say whatever I want. What place do facts have in my argument? These words are no different than the illusion and spectacle of film.
I do truly believe that art should seek some kind of universal truth. I am at times a very depressed film viewer. Films today are based far more on market research than any kind of higher cause. I think you also construe ‘universal truth’ to be something that everyone agrees with. By ‘universal truth’ I mean a statement that can apply to all people everywhere. Decrying the war in Iraq is not a universal truth, but only applies to one specific miniscule instance. There are any number of universal truths that support this argument. A pre-emptive war is fundamentally wrong is a good example.
Moore’s films are trite little pieces of emotional drivel that have no real substance and discourage an intelligent honest and open debate. His films polarize people on issues so completely because they rely so heavily on emotional responses. Moore uses the juxtaposition of factual images to obtain an emotional reaction from his audience and engages their brain so very little that there isn’t much to discuss.
To discuss “Bowling for Columbine” one would first have to run to the internet to check his incorrect statistics on Canadian gun deaths. After doing this, one realizes that many of the differences in fatality rates in gun deaths between the US and Canada have to do with population. The numbers he flashes at you so many times throughout the film is simply his way of convincing you that what he says is fact and not pure fiction.
Although fictional films often use this method to excess, the basic premise of suspending your disbelief is an active process. Viewers are actively aware going into a film that what they are about to see is something construed by the film making team. When a viewer sits down to watch a documentary, their basic premise has changed. A documentary is assumed to be a film about something in real life. The people on screen are not actors at all, but rather people doing what they believe in. When the audience is placed in this position, the film maker crosses the line between an artist and they suddenly become part journalist.
Moore breaks this trust time and time again in his films.
There are glaring lies in his films as well, aside from the manipulation. The most glaring is how he altered a campaign ad by Bush/Qualye in 1988 to superimpose words about Willie Horton over it. These words did not appear in the original ad, yet without some very tedious fact checking this is left relatively obscure. Moore’s basic argument for his whole Canada/America argument is manipulative as well.
I find very little redeeming about Moore’s style at all. I often agree with his conclusions, but it’s hard to hear him argue his case so emotionally when there are so many perfectly logical arguments out there. What facts he does include are often misleading and I do not find them engaging at all.
Moore’s style of film making is indicative of all that wrong with America. He’s sensational and cares little for fact. He looks down on his audience by assuming they can’t handle a serious discussion and instead have to be shown Moore placing an oh so cute photo of a dead boy outside the residence of the President of the NRA.
I will welcome the day when we can start to have a serious discussion about the war in Iraq. When people like George Bush and Michael Moore are finally kicked back into the intellectual gutter from which they came and we can start to actually debate the facts. I look forward to the day when the American public can’t be deceived into going to war out of fear. Most of all, I look forward to a time when sensationalist propaganda doesn’t exist.
PS The 24 frames per second bit sounds like its right out of the mouth of a film professor.
Steve: If I were to read your comments without ever seeing a Moore film, I think I would agree. These surely do sound like deceptive, manipulative and dangerous tactics from an irresponsible filmmaker.
The problem is that I've seen these films, have witnessed Moore's approach, and I don't think anyone goes into his films thinking that they are seeing an in-depth investigative report. They are seeing an essay, a thesis, and that is it. And Moore does not present an entire story, but neither does Dateline NBC or 60 Minutes.
It seems that your biggest problem concerns the misleading aspects of his work - that he is fabricating items which distort the truth. I agree, to a certain disagree, but I don't believe it crosses that boundary into dangerous. I feel that he manipulates the truth, but still presents interesting and relevant informaton.
If he were to literally cut between CEO's and dying children, between SUV drivers and bombs exploding, then I think that would cross a line for me (even though earlier users of montage made even greater leaps). As it stands now, he is talking to people, getting opinions, making arguments and trying to support them.
Or perhaps you're upset that some people go into his movies and leave thinking what he wants them to think. It's not his fault that their opinions are so easily swayed.
In any event, I love Moore's films because they do feel shockingly relevant and timely, and engage a conversation that most other people turn a blind eye to. And the world of cinema can only benefit from having more and more voices.
I'm surprised you want to shut one up, just because you'd make the film differently.
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