Undressing the king

Of course, it is not about a member of the Royal family, what, are you totally bonkers? It is about the one and the only Michael Moore, the king of a new cinema genre defined by NYT as "tweaked documentary". Twisted will be more apt, but then NYT cannot get too rough with their idol.

Michael Moore, some claim, has done more for the cause of progress, enlightenment and justice than any other filmmaker. He has also done very well for himself and his sponsors, being a first documentary maker to break into the seven digit bracket. This in a genre with an established tradition of being impoverished for the cause.

Unfortunately, on the way to success, Moore has also broken another tradition: that of documentary, by the virtue of its name, supposedly telling the truth. Not for Moore the stifling and restricting confines of mere facts. Twisting the reality, ignoring inconvenient facts and plainly lying - all for the cause - is just part of the job for him. And his grateful audience is happily lapping up everything.

But it seems that some of his previously unquestioning supporters are asking questions.

The Toronto-based documentary filmmakers Rick Caine and Debbie Melnyk started out in the first camp. But during the course of making an unauthorized film about Mr. Moore they wound up somewhere in between. In the process, their experience has added a twist to the long-running story of an abrasive social critic who has frequently been criticized from the right, but far less often, as is the case with Ms. Melnyk and Mr. Caine, from his own end of the political spectrum.

Their film "Manufacturing Dissent" will have its premiere on March 10 at the South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Tex. To say it sheds an unflattering light on Mr. Moore — whose work includes the hit "Fahrenheit 9/11" and the Oscar-winning "Bowling for Columbine" — would be an understatement.

The linked article in NYT is too subdued and misses another quote by Melnyk, picked up here:

"If you have to sell out your values and principles to get at a greater truth, where does that leave you?" said Melnyk. "If we think it's wrong for the government to lie and manipulate, how do we think that [those on the left] doing it is the solution?"

Yep. Lying for a good cause is not the way to overcome the fact that you are a fat self-aggrandizing slob. I do not know whether Moore really likes or hates America, and I suspect it is irrelevant, since the only entity he really loves and cherishes is Michael Moore, and he would not let anything, mere facts included, to stand on his way to fame (no matter how dubious) and money (the more the merrier).

Feh.

Cross-posted on Yourish.com

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