Bowling for Columbine movie review

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I just saw Michael Moore's satirical documentary Bowling for Columbine. I say 'first time' because it is definitely worth a second viewing. But that is not to say I would want Moore in my office with his camera crew.
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You may remember Moore as the jerk who made a breathless anti-war statement at that sacred national event, the Oscars. Many people swore off Moore forever because they thought he was rude to a bunch of rich actors and producers by making a political statement when the camera fell on him. I guess they expected a maker of political documentaries to stay away from politics when wearing a tux instead of his usual sweatshirt.
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While I was expecting an exhausting recitation of events at Columbine high school, or a simplistic blather about how banning guns would fix everything, Moore offered a much more wide-ranging analysis.
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The Littleton, Colo. shootings served as the gravitational center of the documentary's orbit, but it wasn't the main subject. Moore develops two connected themes that go a long way toward explaining our murder rate: the American culture of fear and the lack of a social safety net where Americans live.
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Don't turn to Moore for even-handed, balanced documentaries - he knows what he wants to say. He isn't afraid to be rude, but neither was Charlton Heston when he held a pro-gun rally in Littleton, Colo. just ten days after the Columbine shootings.
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Speaking of Heston, the Moore interview with him is something you just have to see to believe. Do you feel sorry for Heston because of his alzheimer's? So do I, but he shouldn't have been president of the organization if he couldn't field hardball questions.
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Moore does a great job of connecting poverty, violence, and the culture of fear. And it isn't just fear of urban crime (scary black men), it's everything - terrorists, rattlesnakes, killer bees, Y2K, you name it. Moore juxtaposes American and Canadian news broadcasts to show how addicted to fear we Americans are.
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The documentary is R-rated, with some profanity, and a lot of scenes of real violence. And if you like to wave the flag, you won't be happy with the recitation of American funding of terrorism and dictatorships around the world. But I really don't believe that makes Moore anti-American - exactly the opposite. Moore seems to want Americans to have done with constant, unwarranted fear, which is a very positive message delivered by an analysis of very negative events.
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I recommend you go see the film, and visit the website. You may laugh, because parts of it are very funny, or you may be outraged if you have a house full of guns and a half dozen flags on your SUV. But you will come away thinking.

- George Wiman