http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050730/ap_ ... moore_hmos
Moore Says Doc Already Has HMOs Spooked

Sat Jul 30, 9:24 AM ET

TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. -
Michael Moore says his next documentary already has HMOs quaking in their boots. Moore has not yet begun shooting the film, "Sicko," but his planned critique of the nation's health care system, he says, is making "freaked-out" HMOs warn employees what to do if approached by the filmmaker.
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"At this point we haven't shot anything yet and they're totally discombobulated," Moore said at the inaugural Traverse City Film Festival. Moore, who lives near Traverse City, founded the film festival with local movie buffs to showcase excellent films.

Moore described good movies as a bridge across the political divide for people "tired of the hate, tired of the yelling, tired of ... the screamfests, the talk radio."

Though the festival is showing films like "Casablanca" and the upcoming
Bill Murray movie "Broken Flowers," Moore's involvement sparked a conservative Texas group to sponsor a rival festival showing Hollywood classics and conservative-themed movies. That festival was to begin Saturday.

While Moore's Traverse City Film Festival puts politics on the back-burner for a weekend, he makes no apology for making politically themed films.

"When in this great democracy did 'political' become a dirty word?"

itll be interesting...i only wish his documentaries WERE documentaries and not persuasion pieces....he needs to show both sides if hes gonna market them as documentaries..they need to be objective, when obviously he has a seperate agenda as do all these "new wave" documentary stooges.

So this one is gonna be about the shitty healthcare in this country? Cool.

Hopefully it will have the same impact as Far. 9/11. Make Michael Moore super rich, and get Bush reelected. HMO's should get scared. Remember the impact of Bowling for Columbine on the gun industry? He truly has the impact of the KKK. The majority of America will go against what he is saying no matter whether it makes sense or not. So if you really support an idea, hope that Moore doesn't agree with you and make a movie about it.

overall, i agree with his ideas, but his work consists of sensationalist bullshit.

Don't his movies tend to contribute to the aforementioned?

his movies ARE the aforementioned its just him doing it in his comfort zone so he doesnt have to actual debate or think...he can wirte and attack.....like somoene said, i agree with his views, but he accomplishes nothing positive....he makes people in the middle hate him and only draws his support from people who already agree....hes not really helping a cause like he claims hes doing a service...hes a moron.

Why would he be advertising that fact that he is making this movie before doing any shooting, and give any potential CEO targets or upper management the opportunity to "prepare" for him?

I love all of Moore's work, but with all the fame (and hate) he has acquired, this just dosent seem rational.

Maybe he will actually stay out of the film itself, and just do the production / naration, and a new sidekick or understudy will emerge.

Michael Moore probably wouldn't have a job if our country wasn't so ripe for satire.

he took a huge step backward with 9/11.....if he goes more the Columbine route, good....if he keeps heading off in the 9/11 direction, he will end up hurting whatever cause he thinks hes doing a service for.

i'm sure it will be a completely bipartisan effort, just like his other excuses for films.

Do you mean partisan?

no. i was being "sarcastic."

Brilliant! A film by him about the Republicans domestic policy is just what we need! I'm getting tired of the war debates, but domestically - no excuses.

I disagree. The only reason 9/11 hurt his cause was because it was released in an election season and the right-wing assaulted the film constantly for a year. As far as filmmaking goes, I thought 9/11 was much better (and demonstrably more honest) than Columbine. Neither was a "documentary" though.

I rented this last night ("Sicko"), and it's a good little movie. While I can't/don't trust everything that Moore has to offer up, he raises some very provocative and important points about our health care vs. our "freedom." Has anyone else seen it and care to comment from a movie point of view, as opposed to an argue about universal health care in America (there's already a long thread about that in N&D)?

I saw this movie when it was released and I must say, I had no idea it was that bad for Americans. I get that MM sometimes does embelish facts and might omit others i.e. Canadian health care covers many costs but we have incredibly long wait times, but what I saw was shocking, even if it was 75% true.
The drug companies fucking people over, sometimes with fatal consequences, just seems like a bad movie plot. Charging poor Americans ridiculous amounts for medications that only cost a fraction elsewhere, to me, should be a jail-able offence. I actually cried when that nice lady who got sick from aiding the 9/11 rescue efforts saw that the inhaller she needs, which costs a couple hundred bucks in the US, only costs less than a dollar in Cuba. And I wasn't alone, others sobbed at that scene in the theater as well. And the fact that they could get help in Cuba from people who seemed to actually want to help was just stunning. Sure, some of it seemed rehersed on the Hospitals part, but the fact remains that all the people that MM took with him got help, whereas they wouldn't have in the US.
Another heartbreaking segment was the little girl who was sick, right in A FUCKING HOSPITAL, wouldn't be treated because her mom's HMO said she had to go to a different hospital. Someone should have gotten the needle for that little girls' death. IMO, that was murder, plain and simple.
And the history on it was an eye opener. Fuckin Nixon started the ball rolling it to make sure the drug companies got paid. And Hillary Clinton takin a payoff after losing her reform war. Sickening.
All in all, I think Sicko is an incredibly important movie and as I said, even if it's only 75% truthfull, more Americans are gonna die thanks to coporate profits.

Clip of Tony Benn (former British Labour member of Parliament) in Sicko:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3HyK5rB9jY