**Official FAHRENHEIT 9/11 Discussion Thread - READ GUIDELINES BEFORE POSTING!*** (1 Viewer)

Saw the film at the first showing today. He took a broad topic and condensed it fairly well, my primary problem were that some of the cuts were too sharp. Of course this was his intention, but some of the laughs covered up specific points made immediately afterward. The other issue was that Lila's strong performances were in such contrast to a not so earlier set of scenes. This needed more separtation. Aside from that I thought it was well laid out and points were made with supporting evidence mixed with comedy and tragedy. His coverage of 9/11 was just as it was for each and every one of us, for those that haven't seen it you will know what I mean when you do. Well done.

Great film, a few walkouts but overall the audience at the noon showing here in Fort Lauderdale (sold out, I may add) loved it... standing ovation afterwards (one "boo!" from the back).

I thought the film was overall better than Bowling for Columbine because I felt that the overall beginning middle and ending came out better in editing (instead of just being different segments like in BfC) but, like others have said in reviews, Michael Moore himself wasn't in it enough. I know that that's a good thing for some people, but Moore's ambushing antics have always made me chuckle and made things a little more personal

I have to say I was much more impressed than I expected. I guess I expected the film to be less powerful emotionally and more humorous. While the humor was definitely present, the film was pretty heavy compared to Moore's previous works. From a technical perspective, I felt it was very well edited.

I was shocked at how full the theater was considering I went in one of the most Republican areas of Indiana. Also suprising, the film got a standing ovation after the credits came on.

I felt they could have focused a tad more on Cheaney, and also the Fox New Channel, but overall a very interesting film.

I was less impressed than I expected. I was expected a more passionate attack by Moore against the Bush administration. It almost seemed to be designed to not set off the conservative elements too much.

It was also less emotional than I expected. It is very easy to influence people emotionally when the subject is 9/11, war and death. Moore did not make too many cheap plays for our feelings.

I enjoyed the movie and everyone else did also. however I don't really expect it to either convince many people to change their view of Bush.

Personally, I like Walter Chaw's take at filmfreakcentral. I think Moore's biggest problem is that he has become bigger and more important than the subject matter. His films were always slanted to express his opinions - call it propaganda if you'd like - but now his opinions, interjections, slants, etc. are more obvious and sloppier than ever before.

This film cost him $6 million to make?? Please.

6 million above-the-line isn't that hard to reach when you consider music rights for a relatively large (for a documentary) release, the cost of film stock and cameras, scoring the film, insurance, salaries for the crewmembers/director, sound mixing, telecine, film processing, flying a crew out to Iraq and putting them up.

Wow, what a film! Bowling for Columbine was probably more consistently entertaining, but Fahrenheit is truly the more powerful and passionate of the two. Which is not to say that it wasn't hilarious, because it was. Especially the last scene.

The screening I went to was packed to the fullest and the film was in one of the biggest screens in the theater. There was huge applause all throughout the film (which unfortunately drowned out some of the dialogue at times) and an absolutely incredible applause at the end. Surprisingly, I didn't notice a single "boo" or walkout. An incredible moviegoing experience in all respects.

I saw it this afternoon and was surprised by the turnout on a Friday afternoon. The per-screen-average is going to be huge.

I generally liked the film. The filmmaking was good and the points Moore makes are sharp. I knew about some of the Bush ties to bin Laden, etc. beforehand, but the film fleshed it out a little more. I took issue with the happy montage of Baghdad before the invasion, which seemed like dramatic overkill, but otherwise I could not find any credibility problems. I wished Moore had covered the Patriot Act more instead of reading portions of it over an ice cream truck speaker. Lila Lipscomb's scenes were emotional without seeming manipulative. It was an effective polemic.

I wish I could have seen the film with a large audience, but I had to settle for a test run of the print with just a couple co-workers (I'll get to see plenty of audience reactions over the next week, however).

Before the film began, I wondered how much different Fahrenheit 9/11 would be from previous Michael Moore films. I thought it would have to be more serious than his other works, and in some ways it is. Still, Moore's trademarks are certainly evident from his amusing opening narration to the always-interesting choices of popular songs to underscore points with a bit of humor. Since the drive of this particular topic is so linear, I think the film could have benefited from less of the branching which served Bowling for Columbine so well. The sections on the Patriot Act and patrolling the border of Oregon seemed a bit superfluous.

I also wanted to mention that I went into the film thinking about the last-minute appeal to get the film's R rating overturned to a PG-13. While there are some gruesome battle scenes and a long shot of a public beheading in the film, I noted one thing that must have sealed the fate of that appeal - the repeating of the chorus of "The Roof Is On Fire" (Bloodhound Gang's "Fire Water Burn" is also played) certainly exceeds the f-word allowance for a PG-13.

Todd,
A quick check with the Watson tools shows this film isn't within 100 miles of your location. Many of these theaters have "The Notebook" and other smaller films. I question if a wider release is really going to solve this. Road Trip.

Edit: I see Todd's post was deleted obviously for not seeing the film. I'm not sure if I should delete this. No big deal how this is dealt with. I have seen the film and my comments are noted earlier in the thread.

I saw it at a 1:20 matinee just outside Toronto (about 90% full with only the crappy rows in the front empty). I loved it. It had a nice mixture of humour, satire, and dead-on seriousness. Many people, including myself, cried when Lila Lipscomb read the letter that her son wrote
.

I do agree with the R rating as there's some pretty heavy stuff here. That being said, I encourage teenagers 13+ to see it with their parents as I think it's an important film for them to see.

When it ended, there was a big round of applause - an extreme rarity up here. Where I live, people don't even react to trailers!

On July 2nd, the film will expand into more theatres so I hope all of you who don't live near a theatre currently playing it will get to see it.

Having seen the film, Moore does have good technique, but his political bias comes through a bit too strong the movie, especially the first half.

In a way, the movie kind of reminded me at times of the infamous propaganda film Der ewige Jude (I saw that film at a film festival some years ago). It's essentially bludgeon-you-on-the-head propaganda, in my humble opinion, which detracts from much of the film. But then, that's Moore's style, so what else do you expect.

But aren't documentaries, by their very nature, supposed to be biased? I'm not talking National Geographic-type things but the ones based on social/economic/political issues? I've always thought of documentaries as a filmed version of the essays and theses that we wrote in school. What all of our teachers always taught us is that we needed to make an argument in our essays and support that with evidence. Isn't that what F9/11 is?

I don't think so. All The President's Men has a dozen or so f-bombs and it's rated PG.

Well, that depends. The dictionary definition of documentary is pretty strict ("of, relating to, or employing documentation in literature or art; broadly : FACTUAL, OBJECTIVE (a documentary film of the war)"), but since it's neigh impossible to be purely objective from a human being's perspective there's wiggle room in the definition. However, by Moore's own admission there has been no strivance towards any kind of objective position in F9/11. He's actually done quite the opposite. Propaganda is defined as "ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further one's cause or to damage an opposing cause; also : a public action having such an effect". Again, by Moore's own admission F9/11 is definitely a collection of ideas and facts spread to deliberately further his cause to damage George Bush's reelection. The definition fits like a glove. Some people say that F9/11 is a mix of propaganda and documentary, but since the definitions are at complete ends of the spectrum I can't accept that. Of course, some will also say that the Bush administration is the Yin and F9/11 is the Yang, so we do end up getting a rounded view in the end anyway...but those are dangerous waters to head towards, so I'll stop right here.

edit

Agreed. The overt anti-Bush stuff was a little hard to swallow (but damn funny at times), but the stuff relating directly to the war was very moving. I'm a big fan of Bowling for Columbine, but I think he's able to illustrate his opinion much better in this film.

There was a big round of applause at the end of my viewing too. Whether Moore's film is propaganda or documentary...or a bit of both, I'm glad people are seeing it. I'd much rather have more people talking about national issues than watching another reality TV series.

All documentaries are biased even if they claim/appear to be objective. The moment you point a camera at a subject and start selecting shots to show in a film a part of your personal bias on the subject material exerts itself on the final product. It's unavoidable. Documentaries that appear objective but which use heavy selective bias are actually the most dangerous form of propaganda. Moore's films, with their painfully obvious bias, are actually far less dangerous because you know the politics of the film-maker and can evaluate what he says with that in mind. Put simply, if it looks like blatant propaganda then it probably isn't, but if it looks objective then beware! It might be, or it might not be. Counterintuitive, but true.

As for the film itself... I was actually expecting Moore to dig up more new material. If you've been following the news from a variety of sources (and not just CNN, which is way more biased than Moore) then you'd probably have already seen lots of material on Bush's connections to the Osama family, etc. (e.g. CBC aired a nice piece on that) Still, there was some really good material such as the marine recruiters in Flint or the state troopers in Oregon. However, I felt the film really bogged down about half-way through when it stopped presenting facts and started focusing on bleeding-heart melodramatics. (i.e. Lila)

Fortunately, Moore does seem to use more self-restraint in this film than he did in BFC or "Roger & Me". I didn't see any facts that seemed out of line, although I suppose only time will tell. As I mentioned above, this isn't a bunch of rabid paranoia coming out of nowhere. Most of what Moore presents in this film has been previously presented by credible news services. Bottom line, it's a good documentary/film essay that sums up the anti-bush side of things very well and is well worth the price of admission.