June 28, 2004
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MICHAEL MOORE – THE LIBERAL VOICE?
Unfairenheit 9/11
The lies of Michael Moore.
By Christopher Hitchens
Posted Monday, June 21, 2004, at 12:26 PM PT
One of the many problems with the American left, and indeed of the American left, has been its image and self-image as something rather too solemn, mirthless, herbivorous, dull, monochrome, righteous, and boring. How many times, in my old days at The Nation magazine, did I hear wistful and semienvious ruminations? Where was the radical Firing Line show? Who will be our Rush Limbaugh? I used privately to hope that the emphasis, if the comrades ever got around to it, would be on the first of those and not the second. But the meetings themselves were so mind-numbing and lugubrious that I thought the danger of success on either front was infinitely slight.
Moore: Trying to have it three ways
Nonetheless, it seems that an answer to this long-felt need is finally beginning to emerge. I exempt Al Franken’s unintentionally funny Air America network, to which I gave a couple of interviews in its early days. There, one could hear the reassuring noise of collapsing scenery and tripped-over wires and be reminded once again that correct politics and smooth media presentation are not even distant cousins. With Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11, however, an entirely new note has been struck. Here we glimpse a possible fusion between the turgid routines of MoveOn.org and the filmic standards, if not exactly the filmic skills, of Sergei Eisenstein or Leni Riefenstahl.
To describe this film as dishonest and demagogic would almost be to promote those terms to the level of respectability. To describe this film as a piece of crap would be to run the risk of a discourse that would never again rise above the excremental. To describe it as an exercise in facile crowd-pleasing would be too obvious. Fahrenheit 9/11 is a sinister exercise in moral frivolity, crudely disguised as an exercise in seriousness. It is also a spectacle of abject political cowardice masking itself as a demonstration of “dissenting” bravery.
Comments (7)
It’s all crap. So much of that movie is based on lies and stupidity. Thank you for printing this. Michael Moore just boils my blood.
The last sentence says it all. Political cowardice masking itself as dissenting bravery. NO kidding.
Gee, Guy. It doesn’t sound like this guy likes Moore much. The appeal of Moore exposes the failure of the American educational system, don’t you think? We’ve now a generation of citizens lacking critical thinking skills.
You should not hold back. Tell us how you really feel. I enjoy your writing. I have not seen the movie, but I will. I do not like Bush.
HEY! i want to see that movie! have you seen it or just posted the controvversy over it…hmmm well yea RANDOM PROPS!
have a nice day:spinning: ooo thats fun
Thanks for the subscription. I too wrote a blog about Fahrenheit 9/11 I wrote it July 15th…see what you think…it contains the comment that I would normaly write here. :wave:
Someone said that “The Corporation” is one I ought to see as well. So far I haven’t seen “F 9/11″. Being from Michigan originally, I quite liked an related to his first older film. I liked Columbine also, though, as I suspect with this one, it is somewhat flawed, or has things I didn’t 100% endorse.