Sicko

Watching Michael Moore's Sicko, I came to realize what the great debate about health care in America is all about. Living in North Dakota, with parents who have Blue Cross/Blue Shield coverage and have never experienced any problems, I was shocked at the stories told by Moore of people who have had terrible experiences with their insurance companies. I was brought to tears while watching people discuss losing their health, loved ones, and homes because of their difficulties with the high cost of health care or with insurance providers who refused to deliver on their promise of medical coverage. I got more and more angry as the stories continued.

Which is exactly what Michael Moore wanted. He wants his viewers to become convinced of his very strong point of view on every subject he tackles in his documentaries. However, even as I felt sadness and angers for these people, I kept asking myself if I was getting the whole truth. Moore is very good at finding the most extreme examples, good and bad, to support his own very strong view that America should have free universal health care.

I found Moore's narration to be very effective. He has a very believable, convincing tone while focusing on just the areas he wishes to use to back up his arguments. He seemed to go to great lengths, traveling across America to find people who have been victims of America's health care system, and then going from Canada to England to France and then Cuba to score points for his promotion of socialized medicine in America.

Where I started to have doubts about the credibility of Moore's positions was the large section devoted to the Canadian system. While he went out of his way to counter the criticism that Canadians do not have access to as good of a system as Americans, through the years I have read articles and have heard first hand from people that Canadians do wait very long for surgery and other procedures, for example. I feel that it's easy for any film maker to find the examples they wish to use to make the point they are striving for and leave out differing opinions.

Reading the other articles, such as Kurt Loder's 'Sicko': Heavily Doctored, we are reminded that our system is not entirely wrong and socialized medicine in other countries is not nearly as perfect as Moore would want us to believe. Loder quotes a British film reviewer who wrote of his own experience spending the night waiting in the hallway of a London hospital, with his severed toe in an ice filled cup, and watching that toe shrivel while he waited for medical attention. Loder cites many examples of current event stories, from Canada to Europe revealing that socialized health care is in serious trouble in many countries. None of this would be believed from watching Moore's Sicko.

No, rather than using news items such as this, Moore emphasizes the strong emotional aspects of this story. Moore gets very personal with his interviews with close up shots of their faces while they are telling their very sad stories. This helps us see the human side of this great national debate. Many critics would probably say that Moore is manipulating us in this process. While this is very effective, one might question whether the problems of millions Americans can really be expressed in just a dozen examples.

There are many positive results of this film in my opinion. Bringing attention to the terrible situation in New York City, where volunteers who worked at Ground Zero following 911, who now suffer health problems because of that and are not getting any attention. The big finish to his film, involving taking several of those 911 volunteers to Cuba for medical attention was obviously very staged and done with the cooperation of the Cuban government, which I am sure enjoyed the positive attention. However, it was a very good thing that these people were able to receive medical advise that they were unable to receive in the U.S. Also, many people are probably surprised to learn how advanced the Cuban health care system is, given the bad relationship that our governments have had since Fidel Castro took power decades ago.

The article From ballet to Buddhism by Guillermo Perez reveals the story of a far different film maker, who takes a much different approach than Michael Moore. Chaille Stovall is obviously quite unique in that he started making films at the age of eight. Beyond that, the articles shows how Stovall takes a very simple, child-like approach to his documentaries. Unlike Moore, who injects himself in scene after scene, making himself a major part of the film, Stovall, like many other film makers, takes a more detached position.

Moore, in great contrast to most film makers, resorts to publicity stunts, comedy, and even outrageous acts as all part of his film making technique. This has brought him many critics including the person mentioned in the film who has a website devoted entirely to bashing Moore.

Generally, I believe this documentary did a good thing in bringing attention to a very important subject that Americans should be discussing. President Obama campaigned saying that he would deliver universal health care to all Americans. This film points out how difficult that may be to deliver and what a great debate it will be in the country. From this film and reading the articles, I can see that there are many sides to this debate and I am uncertain to what the answers are, but expect to learn a lot more as this plays out.