It looks like the kids won’t get to see Fahrenheit 9/11 without some adult supervision. Backers of documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 failed to overturn its R rating on Tuesday, restricting young American moviegoers from seeing its critical look at President Bush and horrific images of the war in Iraq. I don’t need to rant on this again, so I’m just going to make a suggestion: why doesn’t everyone of majority age go find a little tyke in the 13-16 range and buy him/her a ticket. That should take care of this little problem just fine. You won’t even need to escort the wee pup into the theater. It’s the purchase point where there’s a problem. After that, “my mommy’s inside already,” or, “Daddy is parking the car and asked me to get seats. Daddy gets very angry if he doesn’t get his seat, and you don’t want to see Daddy angry!” should work just fine.
And while I’m on the subject of today’s hot pic, I know I’ve been ranting about A.O. Scott a bit recently (and will continue to do so until he writes something valid or interesting), but I want my faithful reader to know that I do not have a fixation on Scott alone. For instance, don’t get me started on EW‘s Owen Gleiberman or the San Francisco Chronicle‘s Mick LaSalle.
However, I also don’t hate everyone. Really, I don’t. And I will absolutely give credit where it’s due. In fact, I love Charlie Suisman’s Manhattan User’s Guide and the MUG article on critics a while back was great, but like Karen Cinecultist expressed yesterday, I was taken aback by MUG’s praise for Scott’s The Terminal review (scroll down to “On the Radar”). If MUG wants to read a wide-ranging and insightful film critique with no filler, he should check-out David Denby’s critique of Michael Moore’s doc in this week’s New Yorker. I’m not a huge fan of Denby, and I definitely don’t always agree with his reviews, but I can tolerate him. His review of Fahrenheit 9/11 reads as a very balanced and insightful examination of what is most likely a movie with a singular point-of-view. Moore has never been a director who tries to show multiple sides of any issue; he wants to give you his argument and pound it home. The “other side” is shown only as the butt of the joke, and any validity an opposite argument may have is usually left out. (And mind you, I say this as someone who agrees with virtually all of what Moore has to say.)
I haven’t seen Fahrenheit 9/11 yet (and I may not be able to until early next week), and maybe I’ll disagree with the overall take in Denby’s piece, but it doesn’t take this one movie to know that Denby is correct when he writes, “Michael Moore has become a sensational entertainer of the already converted, but his enduring problem as a political artist is that he has never known how to change anyone’s politics.” In today’s America where at least 80% of us view everything through the filter of our political beliefs and convictions and where most people seem to get their news from 30 second sound bites, preaching to the converted seems to be all that’s left. The predictable criticisms and defenses from pundits (as opposed to book reviewers) on both sides of the fence this past week over Bill Clinton’s new bestseller simply cements that point.
Out of Focus 
You forgot to mention the unmitigated critical mediocrity that is Lisa Schwarzbaum.
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No, I actually didn’t. I would agree that she’s mediocre, but I can usually tolerate her. Reading Gleiberman, LaSalle and Scott actually gives me a headache.
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I have an annoying Deaniac co-worker who keeps pestering me to go see F9/11. I try to keep my (conservative) politics out of the workplace, and I wish she would do the same.
I’ve been aware of Moore on and off for twenty years, since Roger and Me came out. I remember a reviewer on National Public Radio saying that it was unfair to GM. I never forgot the mental double-take I did, listening to Never Praise Republicans radio saying that a piece of leftist agitprop was too rough on a giant corporation.
Among the many factual takedowns of Moore’s oeuvre available, one of the best is http://www.bowlingfortruth.com
As someone once said, everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but everyone is not entitled to his own facts.
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