film/political issues

“I think that we should just trust our president in every decision that he makes and we should just support that” –Britney Spears

In Fahrenheit 9/11, Michael Moore confronts many political issues and expresses a very strong and powerful point of view, but while doing so he is also able to incorporate comic relief, and get rid of some of the tension that arises when discussing anything political.

When I heard that we were going to have to watch the documentary Fahrenheit 9/11, I thought to myself, “great a boring movie I’m going to have to sit through. It’s probably going to be a bunch of boring interviews thrown together, how am I going to be able to watch the whole thing?!” As I started watching the movie I realized that this is not what it was going to be like at all. Instead I was watching something that I couldn’t stop watching, even though at times I was so angry that I wanted to just stop the movie and walk away, but then at the same time I wanted to keep on watching.

Fahrenheit 9/11 obviously confronts political issues, even if you know nothing about Michael Moore, just from the title of the documentary you can tell that politics is going to be involved. The documentary begins with a discussion of the controversial election of 2000. What was so surprising to me was that some of the things that I was hearing about the election were so new to me, that I wasn’t sure whether they were facts, or if it was just someone making things up. Everything that was said however was indeed true! Being that I was only 8 years old in 2000, I don’t remember much about the election of 2000, so seeing the images of Bush’s inauguration and hearing all of these new facts about the election really made me want to find out more about the election.

This was not the only political issue that Michael confronted, but it was the beginning of his criticism of the Bush administration. Michael Moore also brought up the attacks on September 11th. Along with that he confronted the issue of the war on terror, the war in Iraq, and the issue of nuclear weapons.

With so many political issues addressed throughout the course of the documentary, the question comes up, did Michael Moore present a point of view?

OBVIOUSLY! DUHHHH!

I think that Michael Moore made his point of view quite obvious, without every actually saying “I feel that” or directly stating his opinion. Michael Moore was quite obviously against the war in Iraq, and he was very critical of the results of the election of 2000. Moore is also clearly not a fan of the bush administration or the war on terrorism. But the beautiful thing about Michael Moore’s work I feel is that he never once actually stated a clear opinion about anything, rather it was all just implied (cool right?!). We were able to know all his opinions about everything just by the manner in which he chose to compile the facts and structure the overall film.

I absolutely loved the way Michael Moore added music to different scenes. The music was Moore’s hidden voice within the film. Instead of saying “wow Bush was such an idiot for going on vacation a couple of months after being in office”, he instead showed these same feelings by playing a cheerful, playful vacation song in the background, which basically told us the same thing.

In addition to Moore’s music selection, the way that Moore chose to structure the different components of his documentary was key. Often times when Moore was talking about something serious, he would then quickly switch to a funny scene which would get rid of the tension, which made the film enjoyable. For example, when Moore showed so many different pictures of the innocent civilians dead and injured, I actually had to close my eyes and was scared that he rest of the documentary was going to be gruesome, and that I would not be able to watch the rest. However this did not end up happening, and Moore used a playful scene after this horrific scene to not only relieve tension to make the film easier to watch, but also to add to his political criticism.

Along with music selection and structuring the documentary, another major component for any artist is choosing what you’re going to present to your audience. All artists choose what they wish to show their audience, and what they choose not to show their audience. They do so in order to make sure that their opinions are clearly represented. When Michael Moore made his documentary, he deliberately chose to include certain clips and images of Bush, and chose to omit others. After watching Moore’s documentary anyone would really think that Bush was a complete idiot, this is because everytime Moore presents Bush he seems to be doing or saying something stupid. Had Moore chosen to include a clip of Bush doing something that made him look smart, that could have changed the overall feeling of the documentary. Because of this, Moore’s selection of clips and images was essential to allowing him to get his point of view across without ever coming out directly and saying it.