Misstropolis

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

SICKO

by Tom Meek

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Whatever your feelings about Michael Moore, you’ve got to admit he’s ballsy. He openly courts national controversy with every film and (with the help of a powerful P.R. team) fights back against whoever tries to bury him, whether it’s the auto industry, the NRA or the American government. Like him, hate him, agree or disagree, you end up talking about whatever Moore is pushing (even if it’s talking about Moore being pushy,) and that’s exactly what he wants.

Every film presents a slightly different version of Moore, and SICKO, his much-discussed film about the American health care industry, gives us a docile, somewhat more tentative pot-stirrer. The fire that burned inside of him in ROGER & ME seems to have faded, and he’s more self-conscious, possibly trying to avoid the self-aggrandizing many criticized him for in FAHRENHEIT 9/11.

What we’re left with is an amiable pseudo-journalist who takes us on a magical mystery tour of health care systems around the world. First we get the American horror story beginning with Nixon slackly ok-ing the HMO system that led to doctors at big insurance companies getting paid fat incentives for not treating people. This is painfully illustrated in the story of a machinist who has to determine which or how many of his severed fingers he can afford to sew back on, and the nurse denied experimental treatment for her terminally ill husband who subsequently dies weeks later. Nothing is pretty, not even Hillary Clinton, shown accepting funds from the very insurance companies Moore alleges are guilty.

Onto Canada, London and France where Moore’s “oh wow” expression plays perpetually on his face as he interviews happy campers who get free medical care, no matter their economic status. But Moore’s failure to portray the other side of the story, the negative realities of a socialized medical system, like slow bureaucratic implementation and exorbitant taxes, and his lack of information on the differences in the size, economics and value systems of America as compared to these countries, make the film feel staged, misleading and in the very least, incomplete. 

Of course, the biggest, and now notorious, stunt comes near the film’s end when Moore loads up a boat full of 9/11 rescue volunteers afflicted with various respiratory illnesses and sails them into Guantanamo Bay, propelled by the premise that the terror suspects held there are receiving better health care than the 9/11 volunteers. And while I did find myself wondering if my provider would one day screw me in the extreme ways Moore depicts, or if it was at that very moment screwing sick policy holders with limited means, I was more intrigued by wondering how Moore found these people and how he compelled them to follow his Pied Piper shenanigans. Did they have to sign waivers to indemnify Moore against any aftershocks? The documentary I wanted to see was the unabridged, behind the scenes making of SICKO.

There’s no doubt he’s transformed documentary film into to a powerful political medium, but for all his maverick swagger, Moore has inspired little action with his films. There is that touching moment in BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE when Moore leads two scarred Columbine shooting victims into Wal-Mart’s managerial offices to protest the sale of ammunition over the counter, but in general Moore’s films have not had the impact of films like SUPERSIZE ME or AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH.

If Moore really wants to make a difference, he should go back to his roots, and tell stories like he did in the beginning - from down here on the ground.

To read more from the prolific Tom Meek, visit his blog at http://www.tommeek.com/.