Shooting Michael Moore (2008) Reviews

• Cheesy at First With Great Finish

  Iesius2008-12-19

  Not sure about spoilers and documentaries on IMDb so lets just say my whole comment is a spoiler. Shooting Michael Moore starts off with Michael Moore's high school classmate Kevin Leffler exploring public statements made by Moore to the media. Comments such as "living in Flint." (he didn't FYI) and chronicles his journey from a modern liberal newspaper founder to his Hollywood success. Along the way, some of Moore's hypocrisies, and outright lies are given focus. Some lies, like living in Flint could have been handled in one paragraph taking perhaps a minute of screen time, Leffler gives around ten minutes to the issue and adds theatrics. At first it may seem like this is as good as the movie gets. But, the movie reaches a new level around half way through when Moore's movies are critiqued. This is where the film shines. Especially hidden cameras inside Cuba. In my opinion the film is worth the price of admission for this footage alone. Leffler links up with underground elements in Cuba which allow the viewer footage of places in conditions no care facility in America would be allowed to operate in. And, two of the undergrounders take a hidden camera to the same hospital featured in Sicko. Where they are refused admittance by a receptionist with the stated reason being that they are common Cubans. This half of the movie is very scientific and reasoned. Showing conclusively that, in stark contrast to Moore's happy-go-lucky image of Cuba's health care system, the reality is a grim one where numbers on paper are the priority. I skipped past discussion of the flaws and lies in Moore's other movies as they are the tried true form of propaganda: out of context quotes. This is apparent because Leffler interviews the same people Micheal Moore "interviewed." In the end this Film seems like it was shot linearly and that Leffler learned elements of film making along the way. The end result is a great documentary that I recommend to anyone.

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• Some object to more than just the title, but have you seen it yet?

  tazco2009-08-17

  My name is Jerry Johansen. I am one of the sponsors working with Kevin Leffler in the development of this movie. For the record, we suppose, in hindsight, that one could deduce a violent read in the title, "SHOOTING MICHAEL MOORE", however, that has never been the intent. Honestly, it sounds more like a convenient response to the movie title because the individuals mentioning it don't like the movie's subject matter anyway, and probably will never see the movie while portraying themselves of the movie producers intentions. So, what are/were the intentions of this film? It is an expose'/documentary about a film maker and his less-than-honest means of creating his work. We are not alone in this assessment. Many others who have been on the short end of dealing with Mr. Moore, and often were actually in the movie, were cheated out of compensation they were promised by Moore. The really sad part about Moore's unscrupulous behavior is that he screws over the little guy, the people he portrays himself to protect, to be an advocate. IT JUST ISN'T SO. Another interesting observation: Moore could have done all of his movies with honest means. He certainly had enough money to compensate those he promised to do so. I personally do not get off on railing people...on making someone look bad for the sake of that alone. BUT, I won't look the other way when the lesser among us are being shafted by those who both know better and do it anyway. Shame on you, Mr. Moore. When this movie gets out, and I mean "when", please see it. Sure, there might be a bit of money to be made. But you will see in the credits that Leffler has promised a portion of the profits to those who participated in this movie....and Mike's...Where Mike had promised to pay, but paid NOTHING. In Sicko, Mike shows how wonderful the health care is in Cuba. NOT. What he showed is ONLY for politicians and high-ranking military. It exists on ONE floor in ONE building. You will see our attempts to get a common Cuban citizen into the SAME hospital....see what happens. Then we show you where the common people go for a hospital. It is worse than any third world country. First and foremost, before anything else, this movie is about principles. Doing the right thing. What goes around, comes around. Like the subtitle says, "see how he likes it". We use EXACTLY the same tactics that MM uses. And, of course he hates it. Our objective is to release this movie very soon, nationally. We won't say where because Mr. Moore tends to run interference and we just don't need the headache. Your comments, either way, are always welcome. Email me directly, if you'd like.

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• I object to the title

  kevin-mckague2009-01-07

  "Shooting Michael Moore" is nothing more than a sly tongue-in-cheek call to violence against Mike. It's not funny, and I'm not laughing. I live in Davison, Michigan, the hometown of Michael Moore. Mike has a lot of fans here, but unfortunately I've heard more than one nut state that he'd like to shoot him. Nobody claims that Michael Moore is perfect, but it seems to me that it is a lot easier to find flaws in a couple of his tactics than to dispute the main points that Mike has made in his movies; i.e. G.M. used Flint to build an empire, then left it a wasted core of a city. Instead, many like Leffler blame Michael Moore for making Flint look bad by showing characters like "The Rabbit Lady" in "Roger and Me". Pointing fingers at Mike for the problems of Flint is absurd, and will never result in a single of the city's problems being solved. Kevin Leffler is like many in this town, who seem to be living off of grudges gathered thirty years ago in high school. Instead of trying to make a quick buck off of an old classmate, why not try to present alternative solutions to the problems Mike has discussed in his films? Like him or not, in an era when Americans are accused of having a short attention span and an appetite for nothing more than vapid action films, Michael Moore has convinced millions of us to shell out 8-10 bucks apiece to see a documentary about the most important issues of our time: Urban blight, gun violence, and health care reform. Could Kevin Leffler do that? In an era before Michael Moore, could anybody imagine that anybody could get millions of Americans to see a documentary? I doubt it.

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• A piece of trash...

  kraziepballer2016-08-12

  I can't believe this movie was rated a 5.9 out of 10. Literally one of the worst documentaries I've ever seen. This documentary is fact light, and one of the biggest sources of evidence was people's gut feelings. It was a terrible attempt at slander from my perspective. While there were certain things that did have merit, none of them took away from Michael Moore's work very much, if any at all. Much of it seemed like it was a jealous person from Moore's past throwing mud at the wall and seeing what stuck. I wish I could have my hour and whatever back because the only thing I got from this movie is something that is already far too clear: The people who are watching this movie thinking "This Michael Moore is such a terrible person, blah blah blah," are just spectacularly uneducated and are out of touch with modern society, or any semblance of reality for that matter. Anyway, watch if you feel like laughing at stupid for a while, but I doubt you'll get to the end.

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