Rating: 
Summary: Powerful, somewhat scattered
Review:
Yes, we all know that Moore is trying to push his anti-Bush agenda, but the underlying message needs not a narrator, it explains itself. I found the movie to be a bit scattered at times. I felt Moore was looking for answers in the wrong places.
I don't care whether you agree with Moore's equation (Bush + Saudis = 9/11). That's the trivial obvious message; what I really care is people's lives destroyed for ever. Whether they're American lives or Iraqi lives or Saudi lives it's irrelevant. About 8,000 (~700 American) people have died thus far in a war that supposedly was about an "eminent attack" from Saddam Hussein. Now we KNOW that there NEVER was a threat from Saddam Hussein, that there were NO WMD, and that we attacked iraq because Donald Rumsfeld said that there were "no good targets" in Afghanistan --the place we should be REALLY fighting.
This is a very powerful documentary. Regardless of your party affiliation, it is your responsibility as a citizen of this great country to know what goes on behind the political scene. Don't take it from me or from any talking head, do your own homework and make your own decision. This movie is a must. The movie's plus-and-minuses are:Anti-Bush: +
Anti-War: +
Gore non-Election : -
Going to congress to recruit people for the army: -
Army Recruiting practices: -
Florida election irregularities: -
Unemployment/economics: -
Compelling: +
Powerful: +
Imagery: +
Taliban-Bush relationship: +
Bin Laden family-Bush relationship: +
Real-life stories: +
Raw war footage: + Final Score: 9(+) - 5(-) Hence the star rating I gave.
Rating: 
Summary: Mindless Propaganda for Gullible Lemmings
Review: At the theater, I paid to see "Anchorman" and then watched this nonsense instead (Moore's not going to see a dime from me). This film will only influence those who haven't been paying attention for the last few years. Run a Google search for "Fifty-nine Deceits in Fahrenheit" and you'll see how Moore offers nothing but distortions, lies, and at best half-truths. Objectively, it's a work of propaganda. The islamic terrorist group Hizb'Allah (Party of Allah) has offered assistance to help distribute the film in the Mideast. Now that's an endorsement, eh? Moore's mission is simple: bash Bush. Moore doesn't even show the hijacked airliners hitting the World Trade Center, as he's afraid the audience will remember their anger towards those who attacked America. How deep is Moore's hatred of George Bush? Well, on Sept 12th -- the day after the attacks -- Moore wrote in his electronic newsletter (uppercase in original): "If someone did this to get back at Bush, then they did so by killing thousands of people who DID NOT VOTE for him! Boston, New York, DC, and the planes' destination of California -- these were places that voted AGAINST Bush! Why kill them?" This is the level of derangement we're dealing with here. In Moore's world, the United States attacked Afghanistan in October 2001 to build a pipeline. There's not much else to say about an individual who believes that, nor his film that tries to convince others of the same.
Rating: 
Summary: Nineteen Eighty Moore
Review: Blimey. This is the incendiary documentary that delivers on all FOX/SKY news viewer's worst nightmares. There is not a dull moment in this film which covers polemic issues such as Bush's stealing the 2000 election, his military records, his ties to the Bin Laden family, his shady corporate dealings, the Patriot Act, the reasoning behind invading Iraq and Afghanistan... not one hot potato is left unturned, to mix metaphors... Thankfully, Moore tones down his usual heavy-handed satirical sketches and instead concentrates on the events of the past four years in more or less chronological order, starting with Bush's sleepy start in office and culminating in the ongoing gruesome events in Iraq. However, because of the initial stages of the film, which (rightly) depict Bush as a bumbling privileged cretin, it's hard to believe he could possibly have orchestrated such a successful campaign to convince the American public to support his policies and general erosion of civil liberties worldwide. You will not be bored during this film; angry, disturbed, saddened and (morbidly) amused, maybe. While some reviewers complain of having been manipulated (and Moore is certainly a master propagandist), most actual footage from this film, even if presented with no context or voiceover, would leave a powerful impression. The explosions and screams, whether from New York or Falluja, positively sear through the cinema. Scenes of carnage, grief and torture that up to now were only shown by US TV networks in bowdlerised versions, are displayed in graphic cinematic detail. I remember reading Fahrenheit 451 in Mr. Hughes' English class, and 1984 with Mr. Basely and thinking they were mere far-off dystopian visions. Films like this show you how close we are to those predictions. And it's a little scary. See this film.
Rating:
Summary: Funny to see the ire Mike stimulated
Review: I couldn't wait to see this so, despite having to work awfully early the morning after the opening night, I got in line. The film was supposed to start, I thought, at 9:30. At 9:10 there were already about 60 in line, though, I found out, it was scheduled to start at 9:50. By then, the line was all around the block, and this in a small, relatively convervative community! First, for those all hurt inside (sniff, sniff) that Moore criticized poor George, so what? He made no claims to the contrary. From the very beginning, he said that's what he planned on doing! It's an anti-Bush film, for crying out loud! And for those challenged by the film's role as a "documentary," I say the same I did for those who challenged the "truth" to "Bowling for Columbine." "Documentary" is a misnomer. It's an op-ed piece--or "polemic" as an academically inclined colleague calls it. And I've been saying that for longer than Moore has! Sure it's propoganda, like a colleague screams. But, as an article I liked said, "So is the front page." True, it's an entertaining film. I didn't laugh as hard as I did as in a few scenes in "Bowling." But nor did I shed as many a tear---though I might have for those many who're being perverted by the excuse for a "war" in the Mideast. Toward the beginning, Moore mentions the time Dubya has spent on vacation. Bushies are insulted by that? If I were to attempt the same, I'd be on a street corner with a cup! The scene with John Ashcroft singing his song--right before the comment that he ran against a dead guy and the dead guy won shortly before Dubya appointed him attorney general--had me in stitches. And Moore renting an ice cream truck to read the Patriot Act to Congress--who apparently hadn't bothered to read it before they enacted it--was a gem. But the consequences of that act--surveillance of obviously innocent people for innocuous comments about Bush--now that's not so amusing. There's some "conspiracy theory" for which the film is criticized. Well, how seriously do you take any conspiracy theory? And, if the Bushes have nothing to defend themselves against, then let 'em say that. Most important, the film DID evoke some questions. Hmm...how much money are the Bushes making off the Saudis? I have been inclined to challenge hawks, particularly young ones. If you're so behind the war, then why aren't you at the recruiter now? So, why is there ONE congressperson with a son in Iraq? I'm most amazed, I guess, at where Moore got some of his film clips. One that comes to mind right off is when Dubya was speaking to a room full of people, all of them in tuxedoes. He proclaims that "Some call you the elite. I call you my base." And they all laugh. Sorry, but I don't find that funny. That's dangerous, a sample of Bush's economic mindset, and the source of his economic advice. And the observation that it's the poorer among us who're being recruited into the military (from which nearly all of the Bush administration escaped conveniently during the Vietnam era) has been true at least since Vietnam, maybe even moreso now. Nearly all the criticism I hear of the film is either extraneous, irrelevant, or from those who haven't seen it. Even a conservative colleague--who liked "Bowling" for the same reasons I did--admitted that too many of her peers criticize a film without seeing it. If you don't like Moore, or think he "hates America" or other choice platitudes, then don't go see the film. If you see it, let us have some substantive criticisms, then maybe we can all learn from each other.
Rating:
Summary: Fahrenheit burns fast all the way through
Review: I first saw Fahrenheit more out of curiosity than politics. I thought I would find it tediously political. I was wrong. This is actually an outstanding movie that hits its subject hard and with humor. The film raises some very troubling and important questions, but it is best when Michael Moore backs away and lets the film's images and the mother who lost her son in the war speak for themselves. This is emotionally powerful stuff, and at times, the effect is at once both soaring and searing. Believe me, I was glad for the humor as comic relief. I am generally conservative politically, and I must admit I was a little uncomfortable with the unremitting Bushbashing. However, I came away seriously moved, sobered, thoughtful and with an overpowering sense of tragedy in the making, and not many films in the last ten years have done that to me. So, I give this movie all five stars and a standing ovation. It is a great movie and I recommend it regardless of your political leaning, for this is the kind of film a mature democracy should receive well and with gratitude. Now, let us have one just as good for the conservative voices?
Rating:
Summary: Disney refused to release it. Who own's Disney? Go figure.
Review: I'm a long time documentary fan. I've been watching documentaries for much of my life and I must say that this was simply one of the best documentaries I've seen in a while. Micheal Moore pulls no punches in this intelligently done and well researched film on the Bush Administration and the so called war on terrorism. The film starts out showing how Bush was actually not elected by the people and goes on the show how incompetent he is. Regardless of whether we are republican or democrat, liberal or conservative we all agree that the current situation in Iraq and Afghanistan is one of the worst quagmires of our generation. How did we get into this mess and why? Who are the young men and women putting their lives on the line and how do they really feel about it? How do the families of these young men and women feel about the war and having their children shipped out to fight? Micheal Moore does a very good job at answering these questions by illustrating plausible reasons and letting the viewer decide for himself. I live in a conservative state (or so I've been told) yet this film was playing on two screens in one theator. I was surprised to see that the seats were packed and I could tell by the way much of the audiance would laugh, hiss and jeer in certain scenes that they were not just watching the film to criticize it and Micheal Moore. At the end of the film, the entire audiance was clapping and cheering. I don't go to the movies much, but I don't think I've ever seen such an overwelming affirmative response to any film.
Rating:
Summary: The degree at which truth burns and conscience awakens!
Review: Michael Moore knocks down nine out of ten pins for the thought-provoking, humorous, and ultimately disturbing Fahrenheit 9/11, a title influenced from Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, the temperature at which books burn. Well, this documentary is more a critique of the Bush presidency, beginning as it does with a prologue where Al Gore is poised to become the 43rd president, only to have victory snatched from him in Florida, and how Dubya became the winner of the most contested election since 1876. What adds salt in the wound is how a series of minority representatives protested the ratification of Bush's election, only to be told to shut up by the president of the Senate, Gore himself! Indeed, what kind of president is one who when told of the World Trade Center, simply sits there for seven minutes reading My Pet Goat at a Florida elementary school? Baaaa! Or who says blatantly that is really helps having a father who's US president? But what Moore presents is the dissonance between intelligence reports pre- and post-9/11. In the former, a former acting FBI director tells a committee that Attorney General John Ashcroft did not want to hear anything about terrorist reports. Saddam Hussein is also not considered a serious threat by National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice. And afterwards? The GOP has been criticized for standing for Gas Oil and Petroleum, and Moore's showing the Bush family and the Saudi oil elite conjoined at the hip gives credence to that acronym. Others tied in oil companies include Hamid Karzai, who became Afghanistan's first post-Taliban leader, formerly associated with Unocal 76, Dick Cheney, ex-CEO of Halliburton, but there are others Moore has omitted. As for the effects in this country, much is made of the Fresno for Peace group, who had their group infiltrated, but he doesn't adequately cover the ramifications of the PATRIOT Act enough. What comes clear from Representative John McDermott (D-WA) is how fear (the red, orange alerts) and uncertainty is used to control people. In one clip, Bush jokes how a dictatorship would be easier!!!!!! Moore's use of pop songs as backing for certain scenes range from hilarious to chilling. An example of the latter is Papa Bush smiling and exchanges greetings with the Saudi sheiks, when R.E.M. and Kate Pierson chime in with "Shiny Happy People," or the Go-Go's "Vacation" in scenes of Junior on vacation in Texas. Anger-inducing is the Playstation/XBOX mentality the young soldiers in tanks have, requiring a song mirroring the situation while in Iraq made me angry. Examples: Drowning Pool's "Let The Bodies Hit The Floor" and the Bloodhound Gang's "Fire Water Burn," with key lyrics "we don't need no water let the mf burn." Which leads to the conduct of the war in Iraq. The Iraqi people never committed acts of terrorism against Americans, and yet the civilians are the casualties in a war supposed to liberate them. One angry and grieving Iraqi woman says there has been five funerals because of the bombing. Indeed, Moore's narration uses the word "invaded" in regards to Iraq. The footage of burned and injured Iraqis is disturbing and horrific. Yet the onset of attacks against US soldiers lead the soldiers to wonder what they are doing here, clueless to the fact that the Iraqi civilians didn't ask for them. One Corporal Henderson, he is willing to risk prison rather than return, and even helps Moore trying to persuade Congressmen to get their children to serve in Iraq. Which leads to the rich/poor division in this country. As in Vietnam and Desert Storm, it's the minorities in decrepit neighbourhoods like Moore's own Flint, Michigan that end up serving. But disturbing effects are the Marine Mutt and Jeff pair who recruit African-American youth using a slick business-like sales pitch, and the amputees who have been abandoned due to Dubya's cutting veteran's benefits. And who is benefiting from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq? The American people or the oil companies? As Bush says in one fundraiser, "They call you the elite. I call you my base." I expected something controversial along the lines of Thierry Meyssan's L'Effroyable Imposture, but the fact that it wasn't tells how Moore was eschewing something inflammatory and wanted to present something that he wanted everyone to watch, and to reawaken moral and political consciences, for his base.
Rating:
Summary: Valuable Film with Invaluable Information.
Review: Riveting is an understatement for this movie. There are some who stay on top of the news and know most of what is presented in this movie and those of us are infuriated at the current administration. Now maybe more people will have knowledge and become less complacent about what is happening to us as a country. What I think is so wonderful about Michael Moore putting this information in movie form is, for those who do not read, who trust what is spoon fed to them on a daily basis from the media and a media which is pretty much under control of the Bush White House, will have their eyes open. My only complaint, and this is a very small one, is that Michael Moore sometimes finds it necessary to edit things to emphasize his position, when it isn't necessary at all. The truth can stand on it's own. Example being the Senator who was asked if he would send his child to Iraq and had a surprised look, then it cut away to the next scene. I saw him interviewed and he is upset because he does have family members in Iraq (I believe nephews). It would be more advantageous to show things as they are, because, let's face it, it's pretty darn bad, all on it's own. Great movie that will have a big impact.
Rating:
Summary: A Must-See!
Review: The good news: I just came back from watching a great Horror movie. The bad news: the Horror is real. Michael Moore, the documentary filmmaker famous for his flat Midwestern accent, his girth and brilliant muckraking films such as ROGER & ME (1989), THE BIG ONE (1997) and BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE (2002, this one unseen by me as of yet), has crafted what may be his ultimate depiction of sad reality. This is about our nation's present situation in Iraq and how we came to be there, how it is currently being fought, how it is justified by those who are in power but don't have any children serving in Iraq, etc. It begins with a pre-title sequence showing the horrific event that started this ball rolling: the stealing of the Presidency by George W. Bush. From the early days of the Bush Administration, which show Georgie out fishing in Kennebunkport, Maine, relaxing in his ranch in Crawford, Texas (and claiming to be "taking care of business" in the meantime), to the aftermath of September 11, 2001, we are presented with the facts as they unfurled before various videocameras and live cable feeds. We are presented with an administration run by men whose families have strong business and personal ties with Saudi Arabian government officials and billionaire businessmen, with a Vice President whose oil company he chaired (immediately before his current job of serving the public as the nation's #2 man) being granted one no-bid contract after the other, and reaping billions in dollars in profit in the process, with soldiers being targeted for recruitment out of the poorest neighborhoods (that were, ironically, made even poorer by the current administration's economic policies) by slathering Marine recruiters to fight a war---a war that they had nothing to do with, against an enemy who had never laid hands on American soil or an American citizen, for a cause that was misrepresented to begin with, to fight a war that supposedly ended on May 1st of last year, and which is still being fought as these words are being typed today. As you are reading them on some other day. Perhaps while one of your loved ones is fighting. Or being killed. That, I believe, is the point of FAHRENHEIT 9/11 (2004), a film made---believe it or not---to honor those who face this daily hell, either as a soldier or an agonized family member. A hell that they did not create, yet are expected to "win." Some of you reading this review may be among those who accuse Michael Moore of politicizing this war, or 9/11 itself. Yet by actually *watching* this film, it is clearly seen that George W. Bush (along with his entire entourage of Cabinet members such as Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Assistant Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice) has politicized the war by sporadically using the "Security Level Alert" system (or whatever it's called) to create fear and tension throughout the American populace, and using that fear to hype-up support for a war that has been waged almost entirely for business reasons; ironically, for reasons that hold no benefit whatsoever for the average American. As one war-supporting woman in the film says, you may think the events in this film are all "staged." Sure they were staged; by the President, his Cabinet officials, by the U.S. military, even by the national network TV news stations. Lastly, some of you may decry this film as "propaganda." Oh, I *love* that one! You want propaganda? Turn on Fox News Channel any day of the week, any time of the day---there, you'll get Bush Admin propaganda 24/7. Still want to accuse Michael Moore of political propagandizing? Fine, but think about this: at least his "propaganda" hasn't directly led to hundreds (perhaps soon to be thousands) of American soldiers losing their lives. Or to thousands (perhaps soon to be tens of thousands) of innocent Iraqi people being killed by their "protectors." All Moore is doing is encapsulating reality, by shrinking down the millions of hours of broadcasting and giving us the facts. The facts like the Saudi Arabian embassy being across the street from the Watergate hotel and prominent U.S. Government buildings (the only such embassy, by the way, that has continual Secret Service protection). Facts such as arch-conservative (and former Nixon administration official) Richard Perle confessing that Bush had gotten it all wrong when he decided to go after Iraq. Facts like a self-proclaimed "conservative" from Moore's hometown of Flint, Michigan who had been a strong war-supporter, until that very war took the life of her son. Other facts too numerous to mention here. For more information as to how wrong our current path is, please see this film. It just may make you angry enough to vote Bush out in November. MOST RECOMMENDED; AGES 14 & UP
Rating: 
Summary: The facts are here, but the movie is relentlessly boring!
Review: The smartest comment in Michael Moore's newest one-sided diatribe comes not from a high-level anti-Bush official or Moore or some Washington insider...but George W. Bush himself. Moore is attempting to get a word from him and - get this - Bush says, "You'd better behave yourself. And get a real job!" That's somewhat the way I felt after sitting through two mind-numbingly boring hours of 9/11 - the movie that won the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. Beats me. In this little review, I don't plan on discussing Moore politics, things said in the movie, whether the fat schlub is right or not, or anything like that. I'm treating it like it deserves to be treated (and how it wasn't treated at Cannes) - as a movie. And as a movie, it's dull. And that's really the most surprising thing about Fahrenheit. I went into it prepared to go any way on the movie, though, I admit, I'm not a fan of the way Moore manipulates facts (read: lies) to get his point across. I possibly anticipated getting upset with his blazingly manipulated facts, manipulative filmmaking techniques...but no; that stuff is alright in some ways. The movie is just a snoozer. Which surprises me, considering Bowling For Columbine, though shamelessly manipulative and annoying, was at least highly enjoyable and full of a zest for filmmaking. I recently commented on someone's xanga, kind of defending Moore, saying that even though he does bend the truth, at least he does it with a passion and flare that some fictional filmmakers can't match. CrzyMuthaRugger just needs to see Fahrenheit to prove me wrong. Though Moore seems more fired up about this whole situation than anything else he's ever done, the movie feels like a two-hour-long Dateline special. And I think I just insulted Dateline. But don't think that he's thrown his shameless audience manipulation away for, well, boredom; that's here too. In the entire first half of the film, he spends a great deal of time putting thoughts into Bush's head via narration. I don't like the hick, but it's just plain unfair; Moore has no idea what the man was/is thinking, and it's not something that should have been done in this documentary. At one point, Moore asks, paraphrased, "Would it be rude to say that the Bushes wake up in the morning and think 'What's best for the Saudi's,' not 'What's good for the United States?'" I said out loud, "Yes, it is rude." But Moore has a penchant for turning rudeness into snarky charm, something that worked for a good deal of Columbine. In a scene toward the end, he goes to Congressmen asking if they'd enlist their kids to fight in the war in Iraq. Think about this for a second: would any person, without hesitation, stand on a street corner and sign their kids up for the war just like that? No, and Moore knows that. He just does it anyways, to get them running away on film (running away is the best idea anyone Moore attempts to interview can have). The only section of the movie that really, truly works is a sequence past the halfway point in which Moore explores how the U.S. began the war with Iraq. Here, the dude really has some solid ground on which to stand, and he does relay the facts with the video footage in a way that reminded me of what a good documentary can do. And I give him his due credit for that. But it all goes down the tube soon when he starts making broad parallells in his narration and veering off again...and 9/11 is where it was when it started: Dullsville. Don't think that I'm giving this a bad review because I don't agree with Moore. I do - Bush is a douchebag, and I hope come November things change. But just because this movie loosely follows my views doesn't mean it's automatically good. Fahrenheit 9/11, a film that could have been intriguing, exciting and relentlessly probing is simply a monotonous presentation of facts that achieves the full effect of numbness upon the viewer. I am baffled at the fact that this won at Cannes, but it's pretty easy to explain why: the coveted Palme D'Or is nothing more than a show of political support. That's kind of sad, considering the fact that I'm sure there were many other films that had a zest for filmmaking, a desire to tell a story, and the power to move their audiences. Fahrenheit 9/11, despite what you've heard, has none. GRADE: C-
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