At this point, writing up much of a review is more or less pointless. If you’re of a mind to see this film, you’re quite likely to already, and if you’re not planning on seeing it — well, you should.
Most of what was in Fahrenheit 9/11 I knew about already, of course, having been trolling the various political sites regularly for a while now. The single biggest bit that I didn’t know much about beforehand was shots of the protests in DC during Bush’s inauguration. I’m not in the least surprised that there were protests, I just wasn’t paying as much attention to the news back then, and hadn’t heard much about what happened.
I was also very impressed by how Moore handled the day of the attacks. Rather than show us the same footage of the airplanes hitting the towers that we’ve seen time and time again, he stayed with footage of the reactions of people in the street as they gazed up at the towers, and later, as they moved through the streets, ash and papers floating down around them out of the sky. Far more effective and powerful than if he’d stuck to footage that we’d already seen enough times to become at least somewhat inured to the horror.
I was also a little surprised at some of the things that weren’t mentioned in the film. At one point, Moore mentions some of the member nations that joined the US in the “Coalition of the Willing” for the attack against Iraq, calling out a few that didn’t actually have any military forces to contribute. What he didn’t choose to mention, though, was something that I looked into at one point — the human rights records of the member nations. Rather disturbing to see what some of our partners in “fighting for democracy” are doing on their own turf.
My one real worry about the film is that it’s going to be preaching to the choir for most of its run. At least now, in its initial theatrical run, it’s far more likely that the majority of the people seeing it are people like me, who don’t need to be convinced that Bush needs to go. If Moore and Lion’s Gate/Miramax can get Fahrenheit 9/11 into the video market by mid-to late September or early October, though, the increased exposure of rentals might end up reaching a far wider range of people who aren’t as likely to bother seeing it in the theatre.
One can hope, at least.
iTunes: “Instruments of Darkness” by Art of Noise, The from the album Best of Rave, The Vol. 1 (1991, 3:40).