A group of us saw F.911 a few days ago. We had dinner afterwards and talked about it. Here's several comments. - It's powerful, yes, but you feel that you're being manipulated. Emotional persuasions are used instead of factual arguments. - Michael Moore is Rush Limbaugh's mirror twin. Neither of these obese populists are involved in politics in a meaningful or constructive way. Both use appeals to emotion. Both attack their targets relentlessly, but there's not really a reason for that attack. Moore, despite his appearance as a "man of the working class", has never really held a working class job. He's always been in media in one way or another. Why does Moore hate Bush? For the same reason Limbaugh attacks Clinton: it draws a paying audience. Both are entertainers. - The movie is not a documentary. It is a mishmash of facts, innuendos, personal attacks, jokes, and everything else, but it's not a documentary. A friend who is an expert on documentaries laughed and said "no documentary film maker would make such a film". - The movie would have made better sense if he made his points and then at the end, repeated those points. Instead, you come out feeling as if you had just seen Moulin Rouge (the recent movie): a long series of this, that, and something else. But Moore wasn't making a documentary or any kind of reasoned argument. It's just entertainment. - Moore's Columbine made $21 million. F.911 will easily make more. Moore will be rather wealthy, very powerful, and utterly intolerable. He will get funding for whatever project he dreams up. A recent New Yorker article on Moore pointed out that Moore is self-centered and difficult. He has left a long string of wrecks behind him. Add millions of dollars to such a personality, plus a few major awards, and you get bad news: another Limbaugh, televangelist, or Father McCoughlin. - Regrettably, success sells. Moore's Columbine made $21 million. This one will easily make more. Moore's "style" may become the new style of "documentaries". We will see politics sink yet further into rants and wild accusations. - The Right's complaints about Moore are amusing: they have Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Pat Robertson, and the editorial staff of the Wall Street Journal. They certainly know about rabblerousers. Yes, the movie is worth seeing, to know what he is doing. yrs, andreas www.andreas.com ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html