Universal Health Care for the Cinematically Challenged

I can't admit to be being one of the first to see Michael Moore's newest "documentary" , but I can admit to walking out of it.

First of all, I think the word documentary gets tossed around pretty lightly when we talk about this man's body of work. Perhaps the reason we label him so is simply because we need to categorize his movies somehow and this is the form it reminds us of. Sure, the camera has that recognizable docu-view that suggests it wasn't filmed in panavision, the interviewees certainly appear to be real, but I can't remember the last time I saw a documentary where the director pretends to be an idiot to prove his point.

Or can I?

I can remember seeing the academy award-winning Born Into Brothels, during which I was saddened, appalled, even moved to a point of silence when the credits rolled. I can remember the first time I saw Stacy Peralta's Z-Boys masterpiece and feeling fully immersed in the birth of skateboarding. While it's unfair to say that either were shot and edited from an objective standpoint, I don't remember a less-than funny sarcastic narrator spelling out the obvious.

Maybe my biggest frustration with Sicko is that it could've been a good movie. Moore chose the right topic, more in line with Bowling for Columbine than the dread Fahrenheit 9/11. He addresses an issue that affects all of us, conservative or leftist, rich (to a degree) and poor. There is no doubting that Canada, Britain, France, and many other "first-world" countries with socialized medicine have a much better deal, but Moore establishes this within the first hour of the film.

After too many examples of Americans-with-health-insurance-who-got-fucked-anyways stories, we then witness a solid forty-five minutes of foreigners and glorified expats being interviewed by a dumbed-down Moore. An inexact, but for all intents and purposes accurate example follows:

Moore: Were you treated?
Canadian in ER: Yes, fully.
Moore: How much did you pay?
C in ER: Nothing...
Moore: Nothing?
C in ER: Nope.
Moore: Will you get a bill?
C in ER: No...
Moore: Really?
C in ER: Yeah.
Moore: How long did you wait?
C in ER: 20 minutes.
Moore: Really?
C in ER (confused): Yep...
Moore: Did you know we have to pay for treatment in the US?
C in ER: Yeah, that sucks huh?

This wouldn't be awful if it didn't persist over and over again for the majority of the movie. We all dealt with Moore's need to come across in a sarcastic "duh, this is a no-brainer" style in Columbine and loved it anyways. Furthermoore (you're welcome), the movie develops no further than a big-budget stunt that flops into Moore trying to convince people he still loves the US by getting the Havana FD to hug some 9/11 rescue workers.

Walking out probably no more than 5 minutes away from the credits, my friend and I remarked that it was too much and we couldn't care less how Sicko supposedly resolved because we had gotten the idea 15 minutes into the movie. There was no doubt in either of our minds that Universal Health Care is a working system that this country could seriously benefit from, but we did check to make sure that we were well on our way to college and not in Kindergarten as Moore apparently believes most of his viewers are.

Sicko tackles a more than prominent issue in the coming presidential election, but it could've been an hour-long special on HBO. With any luck, Matt Stone and Trey Parker will donate at least part of a new episode in the coming season to bashing Moore again; keep in mind, he is still a big fat idiot.