Newsday.com - From margin to mainstream

Newsday.com - Opinion: "Whoever thought a documentary film would have the ability to make Republicans sweat? Distributors usually try to hide the 'd-word' when they're marketing a movie.

But 'Fahrenheit 9/11' isn't just a documentary. It's a huge hit, a political phenomenon, and every showing, it seems, is a transforming group experience. And it may signal new strategies both in politics and in movies.

Michael Moore has created a jeering polemic, an argument fueled by rage, scorn and mockery. Moore milks laughs with inappropriate music (childish tinkling as our nation's officials tell lies or 'fairy tales'), shots of officials grooming themselves for TV and juxtaposing shots so that someone's words are contradicted by an image. He's a pro at the ambush interview and the theatrical confrontation.

It seems to break a kind of spell of silence. People pick up on the anger, and audiences become communities even as they watch.

Is the film fair? Of course not. It doesn't intend to be. A retired Navy officer at the screening I attended said afterward, 'There were so many cheap shots - and I loved every one of them.'"


BY PAT AUFDERHEIDE