TRUTH, FICTION & 'FAHRENHEIT'
CRITICS SAY MOORE CLAIMS ARE FICTIONAL, BUT FILM USES PUBLIC RECORD AS BASIS FOR FACTUAL ASSERTIONS
26 June 2004

The political story of the week seems to be Michael Moore's documentary film, Fahrenheit 9/11. The film won top prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and has received widespread critical acclaim for its cinematic quality. The harshest critics have sought to undermine claims of fact made by the film about Bush actions and connections.

The central point of contention has been the film's comment on the flights which the Bush administration reportedly arranged for influential Saudis, including members of the Bin Laden family, only 2 days after the 9/11 attacks. The White House actually began refuting claims in the movie before anyone from the White House had seen the film.

It turns out the White House has been denying that particular fact for nearly 3 years, even though the 9/11 Commission has already published proof the flights were arranged and did occur. The aim of the campaign to discredit the film is to succeed in using the mainstream television media to perpetuate the myth that there was no such special arrangement, that the reported fact is actually a brazen lie, and that therefore the film should be taken as partisan propaganda and nothing else.

In fact, a thorough examination of the film seems to indicate that the central claims of fact are based entirely on information in the public domain. So much so that a New York Times article recounting one of the first screenings of the film criticizes Moore's reliance on evidence already "strenuously reported". Clearly, Michael Moore was not out to make a nakedly vicious attack ad; he was out to tell a story, and he wanted to tell a coherent story unlike the one that has prevailed in our mainstream media during Bush's term in office. While he reports on already-reported stories, he stitches them together to make a statement that no mainstream news source has been willing to make. He seeks to defend his point of view, in an environment where false neutrality often boxes out factual reporting.

There is something very important to note about Moore's telling of the truth: he does not tell the whole truth, but he does not tell a wholly partisan truth either. Many of the most serious allegations critics have made of the Bush administration, supported by direct or indirect evidence, was excluded from the film. He did not use images of the Twin Towers to exacerbate his claim that the President's policies failed in the face of terrorism. He uses images of the President, a timeline, testimony before Congress, and information gathered from government documents, to tell the story of what relationship the President has to the job he seeks to keep.

The film is a personal account of four years in the life of the United States. Moore visits his hometown of Flint, Michigan, talks to a mother who lost her son in Iraq, portrays ordinary people beset by poverty and a lack of opportunity, who turn to the military to save their lives and their families from hardship. He chooses to speak with those people who share his views, or who have come to share his views, and excludes those who unabashedly support the President. He does so, because he is not a journalist reporting on a controversial issue; he is a film-maker telling a personal story, in documentary format.

His purpose is not to present two arguments and foster the kind of idle debating society the White House so much maligned in its criticism of the United Nations. His purpose, if one takes the film as a cinematic work, is to fill in gaps in the official story that has spread through our mainstream media, by way of persistent repetition and deference to public officials. Moore's film is an open critique of the media environment which permits statements by public officials to pass for fact, even when there is little to no evidence to support them, and sometimes when well-known evidence actually contradicts them.

He is wary of the way in which prominent news figures so often pass off quote reading as journalism and the opposition of competing quotes as analysis. He implicitly questions the idea that public sentiment polls clearly define the public interest, which is often used by media organizations to excuse shameless commercialism and tabloid-style reporting.

It is safe to say that Mr. Moore makes a clear political statement with his film, and it is safe to say that the most devout Republicans will be offended by what it shows, but that alone does not mean the film is not a fair account, considering the broad spectrum of pro-Bush talk radio programs, and the unabashedly partisan stars of the FOX News Channel.

Conservative voters and avid Bush supporters will still be able to make up their own minds after viewing this film; it is not necessarily designed to persuade individual voters. But anyone who watches will come away knowing more about the present executive administration, and able to inform their ultimate decision with knowledge not immediately available in the everyday political sphere.

What is perhaps most important about this film is that it does not purport to be journalism as such, and is therefore not part of the usual dialogue of right versus left; it seeks to document the attitudes of a government and the lives of average people, and to demonstrate where those two competing realities create friction. Moore wants his film to remind that when the attitudes of government and the lives of ordinary people are in competition, it is ultimately to the People that the government belongs.

Moore's major bias is for the "underdog", a sentiment supported by one of his featured subjects, the military mother and public servant from Flint. The central premise of his film is not that Bush must be removed at all costs, and he never mentions John Kerry or the Democratic campaign. Instead, he suggests through an array of rhetorical questions and factual evidence that the current government is not primarily interested in the wellbeing of the average American.

It is no wonder that those who are the subject of this characterization would prefer to silence the film, its message and to prevent the public from hearing about it or having access to it. It makes sense, emotionally. But those who wish its message were different would probably be better served by adopting behavior that favors basic democratic values, not by aggressively pursuing its censorhip, which would only seem to prove the theory.

If the 'absolute neutrality' press doctrine is inviolable, and if our media actually adhere to that standard, and through it tell us the truth, then shouldn't the government, and the press allow moviegoers to decide for themselves? In the interests of an open society, this film, which does not make any wild accusations, which does not use pornographic violence, which does not lie, but instead uses news footage, public documents and interviews, should be available to anyone who wishes to see it. [s]