Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004, USA, Michael Moore) AKA Burn Baby Burn

I could take up valuable time and space complaining about how Moore kinda punted this here attempt to eviscerate George II, but I’m more distressed by the way the media and critics have been piling on the man for being "unfair" to their beloved President. Critics on both the left and right are claiming that Moore has betrayed some sorta journalistic ethos in his single-minded, two-barreled assault on their Commander in Chief, which seems to me to completely miss the point of Moore’s entire cinematic career. Michael Moore is NOT a journalist. He’s an entertainer and a partisan with a very specific political agenda which he usually promotes very well. We should not expect Moore to present some sort of even-handed study of the Bush Presidency any more than we should expect a prosecutor to help a defense attorney acquit her client. Anybody who uses this as an excuse to heap criticism on Moore’s film is not doing a very good job of thinking through the whole Moore ouevre and filmmaking raison d’etre.

Anyways, my full length Apollo Guide review is here.

Score: 74/100

The Notebook (2004, USA, Nick Cassavettes)

Boy, did the trailers for this ever have me cringing in my seat as the lights went down. That it is merely only eminently forgettable and not completely execrable turned out to be one of the few pleasant surprises of the evening. Well, the film certainly is gorgeous, as are the two leads; Rachel MacAdams in particular looks like she’s going to have a long and varied career, based on her work here and in Mean Girls. Still, you can’t help but wonder if dear old papa Cassavettes isn’t looking on from the great beyond with some disdain at the direction his son’s career has taken. The Notebook is the kind of conventional film that John C. spent his whole career challenging with his provocative and intelligent studies of human behaviour. However, first with John Q and now The Notebook, Nick C. has begun indulging in the sort ofsentimental tear-jerking romanticism that he had once managed to mask so well with the unusual story of oddball characters in She’s So Lovely. Playing with age-old conflicts and themes, Cassavettes brings nothing new to the game, and seems satisfied to allow this cornball story to play itself out without providing it with any semblance of a personal stamp. As a result, despite the mildlly pleasant surprise that The Notebook wasn’t completely rancid, the film proves ultimately and unfortunately completely forgettable.

My full length Apollo Guide review is here.

Score: 65/100