Reviews

Not sure about spoilers and documentaries on IMDb so lets just say my whole comment is a spoiler.

Shooting Michael Moore starts off with Michael Moore's high school classmate Kevin Leffler exploring public statements made by Moore to the media. Comments such as "living in Flint." (he didn't FYI) and chronicles his journey from a modern liberal newspaper founder to his Hollywood success. Along the way, some of Moore's hypocrisies, and outright lies are given focus.

Some lies, like living in Flint could have been handled in one paragraph taking perhaps a minute of screen time, Leffler gives around ten minutes to the issue and adds theatrics. At first it may seem like this is as good as the movie gets. But, the movie reaches a new level around half way through when Moore's movies are critiqued. This is where the film shines. Especially hidden cameras inside Cuba. In my opinion the film is worth the price of admission for this footage alone.

Leffler links up with underground elements in Cuba which allow the viewer footage of places in conditions no care facility in America would be allowed to operate in. And, two of the undergrounders take a hidden camera to the same hospital featured in Sicko. Where they are refused admittance by a receptionist with the stated reason being that they are common Cubans.

This half of the movie is very scientific and reasoned. Showing conclusively that, in stark contrast to Moore's happy-go-lucky image of Cuba's health care system, the reality is a grim one where numbers on paper are the priority.

I skipped past discussion of the flaws and lies in Moore's other movies as they are the tried true form of propaganda: out of context quotes. This is apparent because Leffler interviews the same people Micheal Moore "interviewed."

In the end this Film seems like it was shot linearly and that Leffler learned elements of film making along the way. The end result is a great documentary that I recommend to anyone.

Another reviewer of this film said this movie was "an excellent depiction of Europe today"....if so, then that is sad. There is no narrative of which to speak stuff just happens at random -- maybe that's suppose to symbolize Europe, or life in today's world, but last I checked that was life all throughout time... All I know is that enough randomness is chaos and causes depression. And after seeing this film that's what I am, depressed. While watching this film my mind hearkened back numerous times to what I was told about movies broadcast in Iraq by the government while under the regime of Saddam Hussein; movies would play for 20 minutes then be dropped in favor of something completely different. Or that the ending would be missing. This tactic was used by the government to control descent.

This movie is the equivalent of some mangled metal modern art masterpiece, what goes on in the work could mean anything to anyone, assigned meaning is suppose to come from Michael Haneke's history in the business as someone who rejects standard conventions of timing , build up of suspense, and logical plot development for the purposes of inducing boredom, irritation, and frustration.

What a suck.

The premise behind this film fails to keep my interests because what goes on after the initial virus hit is so unrealistic that it cannot induce fear in me. A virus turns ordinary people into rage-filled zombies killing most of England's population. Fair enough. The power there goes out and contact with the outside world is lost. The characters assume the worst, they think the rest of the world has suffered the same fate as England, and don't even try to get off the island. Unfortunately for the story writer no one ever told him about things like that radios still pick up signals from France or that a smart character, you know, the kind you care about, might try to use a boat to get off the island. What about the Chunnel? Heck some people can swim across the English Channel. Instead the characters listen to their radio which tells them to come to the British Army...and what a great army it is, because after only one month they have degenerated into a bunch of power-driven thieving rapists -- doesn't Brittan have one of the top 5 armies in the world!??! Yet in the film they can't keep discipline for 4 weeks...unbelievable. Pepsi is everywhere, annoying! And odd seeing as the stuff is hard to find in England. So poorly written, and as for the tagline on the commercials "scariest movie since the exorcist." Wow, they want the viewer to think taking a digital cam quarter and zooming in and out again really fast is scary? Or that people making some of the dumbest decisions ever, and paying for them with their lives is scary? Now I know why I haven't been scared of a movie since I was a kid. Movies like this make me dead inside.

I worked at a theater for 3 years. And every day up in the booth there were these reels just sitting there lost to the world. Eventually before I left the place I put them together and it just happened to be this movie. Some things are lost for a reason...

The movie starts out with a voice over documentary of African wildlife and eventually the old ways of some tribe in the same region. The tribe believes their dead come to life in the form of elephants. Poachers are killing them for their tusks. In the end will the elephants get revenge? Well I'll just let the viewer hope and wait on that one.

While I was happy that the movie was not 4 reels of a documentary the acting was wooden with a few good one liners. The conversations between actors could have been shot at different times as you rarely ever see the characters together. If I had paid any amount of money to see this film I would not be so forgiving with my review. Really bad camera work, no sound track, nuff said.