SiCKO

I had planned to post a few observations about SiCKO today paired with a link to the story I wrote for work, but then...nobody ran my story. Fiddlesticks! Maybe it'll run somewhere tomorrow. It's about the parallels (and dissimilarities) between Moore's appearance before the Judiciary Committee yesterday and the movie itself. That there were similarities is, I suppose, not surprising--Michael Moore in front of a crowd is the same as Michael Moore in his movies.

Needless to say, the movie is compelling, if occasionally plagued by the usual Mooreisms. As an example, and as many of you already know, at the end of the movie, he takes a cadre of ill Americans, including three September 11th volunteers, to Cuba to receive superior medical care. And, indeed, they get good care and cheap medicine and an important point is made: the motivations that drive the U.S. health care system are perverse and corrupt and need desperately to change. Earlier in the film, though, pointing to World Health Organization statistics, Moore narrates: "The United States slipped to 37th in health care around the world, just slightly ahead of Slovenia." This is true. As evidence, the camera scrolls down a long list of countries and settles upon "37 UNITED STATES" just above "38 SLOVENIA". But, noticed one careful-eyed viewer (me), "38 SLOVENIA" tops number 39...which is Cuba.

Of course, these sorts of inconsistencies don't actually change Moore's point--which is correct and important--but they definitely do provide stable footing for the Bill O'Reillys and Larry Kudlows of the world to pivot past him. Which is why, as far as advocacy movies go, I think I'd push for the slightly less entertaining but slightly more serious An Inconvenient Truth "format" over the SiCKO "format". But I'm nitpicking at this point. They're both getting the job done in their own ways.