When I think of a film that we viewed during the semester that demonstrates a strong, adamant political voice, I think of the words Michael Moore. The way he manipulates his own opinion into his documentaries truly makes him an artist that is a political activist. He openly confronts political issues and he does not do it in a way that is openly bias. Moore constructs his opinion through a careful selection of images. I am almost positive that all of us that watched Farenheit 9/11 got the idea of what Moore wanted to say. Moore to me is one of the artist who out of all the films we watched openly expressed his role as a political activist especially in his film Farenheit 9/11.
I am pretty sure that anyone who has watched Farenheit 9/11 knows of the political issues that Moore confronted. Before I viewed the film, I always thought that this documentary was centered only around the Twin Towers. However, now that I watched the whole film, I realized that there are several issues that Moore desired to confront as a political activist. Michael Moore discussed events that revolved around the 9/11 attack such as the controversial 2000 election between Bush and Gore, the terrorist attack, and the war in Iraq. These are the events that Moore focuses on in his production. He also confronts emotional issues as well. He approaches and discusses the reality of war and how soldiers, who we see as on fire for war, are saddened at the responsibility they have to bear on the battlefield. In addition, he approaches families who are grief-stricken at the loss of the sons and daughters on the battlefield and how some Americans are blinded by this fact. These are the issues that Michael Moore strives to confront in his film and uses interesting approaches to discuss these issues.
With a lot of issues to confront, I think structuring the film was a very important task for Michael Moore. As a director, you want to structure your film in a way that will get your point across to the audience as effectively as possible. I know that when I watch films, any movie with poor structuring can immediately lose my interest. However, Michael Moore structured his film in a very logical sequence and addressed all the issues he wanted to discuss. His film flowed from a discussion of the 2000 election to how President Bush’s victory was celebrated by vacation. From this he transitioned to the 9/11 attacks and the war in Iraq. Moore conveyed these issues for the audience to understand. As a part of the audience, I was able to follow the events that happened almost a decade ago with clarity because of the logical structure.
The way that Michael Moore structured his documentary was also influenced by his point of view. From those who have watched the documentary, you can tell that Michael Moore was strongly against how George Bush governed the United States during this moment of terrorism and war in Iraq. He detested the fact that George Bush was constantly on vacation a month before the attack and did not understand how George Bush put so many people in war and not his own children. These are the issues that infuriated Michael Moore and he needed to structure the images of his film in a way that made us as an audience feel this same anger. So Moore only used images that supported his argument. He used the images of Bush’s vacation, the horrors of the war, and several others because he wanted us to have his opinion. Additionally, Michael Moore juxtaposed his images in order to effectively display his point of view. For example, he juxtaposes President Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech with soldiers still in the war and the horrors that have happened to civilians. Through juxtaposing, Michael Moore is able to show his audience that what we hear by politicians and even the news media should not be taken so lightly.
I think that the last part critical to Michael Moore’s film structure was his narration. For me, the narration served as a comic relief when put with certain images. They also serve as an expression of Michael Moore’s opinion and his point of view. He does not explicitly say to us that he despises Bush, but his sarcastic comments show what opinion he really has. In addition, he also used music as a form of narration. The audience is exposed to hearing the song “Vacation” as a comic relief to watch President Bush golf and enjoy the ranch. This was one of the many examples in which music was used as a form of narration to the audience.With all of these features combined, the audience can see his point of view without it blatantly said. Michael Moore fully uses his political voice to fulfill his controversial role as a political activist.
