Poetic Justice

Michael Moore deserves this:

The Political ‘Fahrenheit’ Sets Record at Box Office

LOS ANGELES, June 27 — Michael Moore’s anti-Bush “Fahrenheit 9/11” became the highest-grossing documentary of all time on its first weekend in release, taking in $21.8 million as it packed theaters across the country this weekend.

The movie, mocking President Bush and criticizing his decision to go to war in Iraq, was No. 1 at the box office, beating out the popular comedies “White Chicks” and “DodgeBall,” which were playing on almost triple the number of screens.

Theater owners in large cities and smaller towns reported sellout crowds over the weekend, with numerous theaters declaring house records.

Of course, the first wave of viewers that Moore is preaching to is the choir. It will be interesting to see if attendance at the movie can be sustained by some of the regular parishioners.

One thought about Moore’s “partisanship”: the standard talking point from the right about the movie is that Moore is just a partisan hack pushing his anti-Bush agenda, who just made the movie for propaganda purposes. I’d like to respond to them by turning the causation around. Moore has seen and thought about the things that he puts in his movies. He’s studied the Bush administration in painful detail. And that’s exactly why he’s partisan, and exactly why he has an anti-Bush agenda.

Kash