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Michael Moore looks at guns, violence, and fear
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Michael Moore looks at guns, violence, and fear
May 17, 2002 Posted: 4:19 PM EDT (2019 GMT)
Michael Moore courts controversy once again with his new movie, "Bowling for Columbine."
CANNES, France (AP) -- A Michigan bank advertises a peculiar incentive gift for opening an account: a gun.
So filmmaker Michael Moore visits, asks a few questions -- "the bank is a licensed firearms dealer," a clerk tells him -- and soon walks out with a rifle slung over his shoulder.
Thus starts Moore's new documentary about guns and violence in America, a movie that takes him from his home state of Michigan to Columbine High School in suburban Denver to Charlton Heston's Beverly Hills home.
"Bowling for Columbine" is Moore's fifth movie since his 1989 debut, "Roger and Me." It's also the first documentary to compete in the Cannes Film Festival's main competition in 46 years.
Moore believes America is obsessed with guns, and -- wearing his trademark baseball cap and sagging jeans -- he crossed the United States (and visited Canada) filming 200 hours of footage to find out why.
As in Moore's other films, some of the interviews are uncomfortably funny: The laughs come because people's responses are so absurd.
Other interviews are almost unbearably sad, as when Moore talks to a soccer dad wearing a photo of his son, who was killed in the 1999 Columbine massacre.
At the premiere Friday in France, Moore's film got a prolonged standing ovation. The director thanked the audience and said: "Now the real work is back in the United States, to start to correct these problems."
United Artists picked up the film on Friday for U.S. distribution.
Traveling to Kmart
The title "Bowling for Columbine" refers to a detail about the high-school shooting: Before they opened fire in their school, killing 13 people and then themselves, gunmen Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold went bowling.
After the shooting, the media asked what had gone wrong in their lives. Was it violent movies? The music they listened to? (Harris and Klebold were fans of rocker Marilyn Manson -- who incidentally gives one of the movie's most lucid and well-spoken interviews.)
Some blamed Manson for inspiring the killings; why not blame bowling? Moore asks.
In one chilling sequence, he shows footage from Columbine's surveillance cameras and plays 911 tapes from panicked, breathless callers inside the school.
Later in the film, Moore meets two survivors of the attack, both of whom still have bullets lodged in their bodies. Together, they travel to the headquarters of Kmart, the store where the bullets were bought.
The boys pull up their shirts to show executives their scars, and soon Kmart announces that within 90 days it is pulling bullets for handguns and assault weapons from its shelves.
Columbine is a focal point of the movie, but not its only subject. Moore jumps to other tragedies, from the Oklahoma City bombing to the killing of a 6-year-old girl from Flint, Michigan, who was shot by another 6-year-old who brought a gun to school.
Interviewing Heston
"Bowling for Columbine" is a blast of non-stop images, including a hilarious cartoon about U.S. history that's narrated by a talking bullet.
The movie plays with many contradictions; Moore, who grew up around guns, has been a lifelong member of the National Rifle Association.
He tried for two years to get an interview with Heston, the NRA president and the actor who played Moses in "The Ten Commandments." In the end, Moore bought a map of stars' houses in California and drove to Heston's house.
"I just rang the buzzer, and out of that little box came the voice of Moses," Moore told journalists. He got his interview -- which doesn't make Heston look very good.
The film's strongest point is Moore's talent for pushing his interview subjects further and further, persuading them to tell a little bit more.
He interviews one young man who was kicked out of high school. Why? Moore asks. First, the man says he was on a list of potentially dangerous students. Then he admits he had a copy of the "Anarchist's Cookbook." Eventually, almost boastfully, he admits he once used the book to whip up a few gallons of napalm.
You get a sense he just wanted to talk to someone. And Moore was there to listen.
Copyright 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/SHOWBIZ/Movies/05/17/cannes.michael.moore.ap/index.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
May 17, 2002 Posted: 4:19 PM EDT (2019 GMT)
Michael Moore courts controversy once again with his new movie, "Bowling for Columbine."
CANNES, France (AP) -- A Michigan bank advertises a peculiar incentive gift for opening an account: a gun.
So filmmaker Michael Moore visits, asks a few questions -- "the bank is a licensed firearms dealer," a clerk tells him -- and soon walks out with a rifle slung over his shoulder.
Thus starts Moore's new documentary about guns and violence in America, a movie that takes him from his home state of Michigan to Columbine High School in suburban Denver to Charlton Heston's Beverly Hills home.
"Bowling for Columbine" is Moore's fifth movie since his 1989 debut, "Roger and Me." It's also the first documentary to compete in the Cannes Film Festival's main competition in 46 years.
Moore believes America is obsessed with guns, and -- wearing his trademark baseball cap and sagging jeans -- he crossed the United States (and visited Canada) filming 200 hours of footage to find out why.
As in Moore's other films, some of the interviews are uncomfortably funny: The laughs come because people's responses are so absurd.
Other interviews are almost unbearably sad, as when Moore talks to a soccer dad wearing a photo of his son, who was killed in the 1999 Columbine massacre.
At the premiere Friday in France, Moore's film got a prolonged standing ovation. The director thanked the audience and said: "Now the real work is back in the United States, to start to correct these problems."
United Artists picked up the film on Friday for U.S. distribution.
Traveling to Kmart
The title "Bowling for Columbine" refers to a detail about the high-school shooting: Before they opened fire in their school, killing 13 people and then themselves, gunmen Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold went bowling.
After the shooting, the media asked what had gone wrong in their lives. Was it violent movies? The music they listened to? (Harris and Klebold were fans of rocker Marilyn Manson -- who incidentally gives one of the movie's most lucid and well-spoken interviews.)
Some blamed Manson for inspiring the killings; why not blame bowling? Moore asks.
In one chilling sequence, he shows footage from Columbine's surveillance cameras and plays 911 tapes from panicked, breathless callers inside the school.
Later in the film, Moore meets two survivors of the attack, both of whom still have bullets lodged in their bodies. Together, they travel to the headquarters of Kmart, the store where the bullets were bought.
The boys pull up their shirts to show executives their scars, and soon Kmart announces that within 90 days it is pulling bullets for handguns and assault weapons from its shelves.
Columbine is a focal point of the movie, but not its only subject. Moore jumps to other tragedies, from the Oklahoma City bombing to the killing of a 6-year-old girl from Flint, Michigan, who was shot by another 6-year-old who brought a gun to school.
Interviewing Heston
"Bowling for Columbine" is a blast of non-stop images, including a hilarious cartoon about U.S. history that's narrated by a talking bullet.
The movie plays with many contradictions; Moore, who grew up around guns, has been a lifelong member of the National Rifle Association.
He tried for two years to get an interview with Heston, the NRA president and the actor who played Moses in "The Ten Commandments." In the end, Moore bought a map of stars' houses in California and drove to Heston's house.
"I just rang the buzzer, and out of that little box came the voice of Moses," Moore told journalists. He got his interview -- which doesn't make Heston look very good.
The film's strongest point is Moore's talent for pushing his interview subjects further and further, persuading them to tell a little bit more.
He interviews one young man who was kicked out of high school. Why? Moore asks. First, the man says he was on a list of potentially dangerous students. Then he admits he had a copy of the "Anarchist's Cookbook." Eventually, almost boastfully, he admits he once used the book to whip up a few gallons of napalm.
You get a sense he just wanted to talk to someone. And Moore was there to listen.
Copyright 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/SHOWBIZ/Movies/05/17/cannes.michael.moore.ap/index.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Comments
You know I like your posts, and support your doing so. That said, I'm not posing this question to you to get you to stop, its just an honest question. This part of the post at the bottom of the cut and paste:Copyright 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Doesnt that make it illegal to put this post on the forum? I know this may add fuel to the fire, but I figure telling you about it before someone gets * and rats you out, if it is illegal, would be doing you a favor. I'd just make sure that I didnt include that legal stuff at the end, if it were me, seems kind of self incriminating. Robs
SSgt Ryan E. Roberts, USMC
He's well meaning,and I gather from reading his work,and watching his
movies that,he may be a resonable guy.I wish I had the talent to make a rebuttle film and interview HIM,after showing him the evidence
that supports gun ownweship.Let him talk face-to-face with women
who fended off would be rapists with guns.Then explain to him that
when the day comes that his books,movies,and exposes become outlawed
due to "national security interests"(and that day can still come),
He's going to wish he had more than just a three or four shot hunting rifle to try and take back his right to free speech.
He hates big business, hates George Bush, hates the military, hates guns, and hates Republicans.
I keep remembering that story about the time he was doing a book signing in an exhibition hall. The self-styled champion of the little people refused to end his book-signing 10 minutes early so some poor minimum-wage making janitor could clean the hall in time for the next event.
He's like every other Communist in the history of the world. He gives lip service to defending the rights of the commonfolk and championing the Socialist cause, while lining his pockets with old-fashioned Capitalist earned dollars.
Real prince, that guy is. Sort of like a combination of Tom Green and Fidel Castro.
Edited by - Bullzeye on 05/18/2002 14:55:25
Save, research, then buy the best.Join the NRA, NOW!Teach them young, teach them safe, teach them forever, but most of all, teach them to VOTE!
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878