comments_image -

Michael Moore Gets Ready to Roll

Will it continue to be open season on the 'scruffy guy in a baseball cap' as he prepares a new film on America's ailing health care industry?
 
 
LIKE THIS ARTICLE ?
Join our mailing list:

Sign up to stay up to date on the latest headlines via email.

 
 
 
 

In early January, at the Thirty-First Annual People's Choice Awards, Michael Moore's remarkable documentary film, Fahrenheit 9/11, received the award for "Favorite Movie." Moore thanked the people for voting for the film and said that he was "amazed" to be receiving the award. He then dedicated the award to U.S. troops fighting overseas.

Moore closed by saying that he loved "making movies" and that he would take "this [award] as an invitation to make more Fahrenheit 9/11s." Then, Moore seemed to disappear from the public eye.

However, unlike Richard Nixon, who after losing the 1962 California gubernatorial election to Pat Brown, delivered his "You-won't-have-Richard-Nixon-to-kick-around-anymore" retirement (albeit premature) speech, Moore made no such pledge.

Seven months later, Moore is about to set his cameras rolling.

Any information about a new film by Moore inevitably gets tongues wagging. This time around, months before he was even to begin shooting a new film -- provisionally entitled Sicko, about America's ailing health care industry -- a gaggle of pharmaceutical companies launched a preemptive strike against him and the film. At least six of the country's largest pharmaceutical firms sent memos to their workers warning them to be on the lookout for "a scruffy guy in a baseball cap" who asks too many questions, the Guardian reported.

"We ran a story in our online newspaper saying Moore is embarking on a documentary -- and if you see a scruffy guy in a baseball cap, you'll know who it is," Stephen Lederer, a spokesman for Pfizer Global Research and Development, told the Los Angeles Times.

"Moore's past work has been marked by negativity, so we can only assume it won't be a fair and balanced portrayal," said Rachel Bloom, executive director of corporate communications the Delaware-based firm, AstraZeneca. "His movies resemble docudramas more than documentaries."

Moore's pending film hasn't been his only endeavor attracting attention. When it was announced that Moore was one of the key organizers of the first Traverse City Film Festival -- held in the economically-distressed city of the same name*, near his home in Michigan -- some conservatives considered organizing a boycott of the five-day event held in late July.

In addition to being an unprecedented cultural opportunity for the area, many locals saw the festival as a much-needed economic shot in the arm: Michigan's former Republican Governor William Milliken, the Herrington-Fitch Foundation, and a local radio station that airs conservative talk shows like Rush Limbaugh, all helped support the endeavor.

The festival "was a success beyond anything we had imagined," Moore said in a post-festival press release. "For a city that has a population of only 20,000, to have 50,000 admissions at a film festival here, words can't describe how we feel."

Festival organizers also pointed out that fans consistently packed the house for the free daily panel discussions with directors, writers and Hollywood insiders, and more than 6,000 turned out for the festival's free outdoor showings of Casablanca and Jaws.

In an unprecedented move, festival organizers also announced that they would be purchasing copies of all 2005 films for three county library systems, and providing free public access to the movies.

Instead of a boycott, conservatives opted for their own mini-film festival, a move that likely delighted Moore, who above all else is devoted to movies. Several years back, when he was confronted by conservative filmmaker Evan Coyne Maloney -- who had hoped to "provoke a flustered reaction" that he could post on his blog at Brain-terminal.com -- Moore instead graciously suggested that documentary filmmaking "should be open to all people of all political persuasions." Moore pointed out that filmmaking "should not just be people who are liberal, or left-of-center, or whatever." He encouraged Maloney to make his movies, "and then the people will respond or not respond to them."

submit to reddit

-
Email
Print
Share
LIKED THIS ARTICLE? JOIN OUR EMAIL LIST
Stay up to date with the latest AlterNet headlines via email
Advertisement
Most Read
Most Emailed
Most Discussed
On REDDIT
On DIGG
 
loading most read content ..
Advertisement
AlterNet Radio: What's At Stake in Wisconsin; Real "Defense" Budget Is $1 Trillion; the Right's Phony Race War

By Staff | AlterNet

 
 
Fox, Breitbart, and Ricketts Try to Bring Back D'Souza's Pseudo-Birtherism

By Steve M | No More Mister Nice Blog

 
 
Activists Speak Out Against Lack of Access to Bradley Manning

By Agence France Presse

 
 
NYPD Catches Sexual Assailant, Then Lets Him Go Free Because He Didn't Feel Like Being Questioned

By Jill F | Feministe

 
 
Gov. Scott Orders Purging of Florida’s Voter Rolls - Just in Time For Prez Election

By Adele Stan | AlterNet

 
 
Abortion Clinics Across Country Put On Alert In Wake of Georgia Clinic Arson Cases

By Robin Marty | RH Reality Check

 
 
Former GOP Congresswoman Blasts New GOP Women’s Caucus: ‘They’re Not Voting In Best Interest Of All Women’

By Josh Israel | ThinkProgress

 
 
Debbie Wasserman Schulz is Wrong on Wisconsin

By LaFeminista | DailyKos

 
 
Pro-Coal Group Pays People to Wear Its Shirts at EPA Hearing

By Heather Moyer | Sierra Club

 
 
Kids Inundate NY Governor With Concerns About Fracking

By Seth Gladstone | Food and Water Watch

 
 
 
 
 
loading ...
POWERED BY DIGG'S USERS
 
[ page served from web 2 ]