Michael Moore and ego-driven documentary

Bowling for Columbine. Sicko. Fahrenheit 9/11. Capitalism: A Love Story.  The documentaries of Michael Moore have a lot of things going for them; big-name issues at the head of public debate, brutal honesty of style, and at times a humorous tone.  However, the key aspect of a Michael Moore film, which often disrupts his general appeal to a more critical audience, is ego.

As a documentarian, Moore strives to create an education, yet entertaining film, often turning what what can be serious material into a laughable idiocy.  However, he does this not through subtlety, but through his own personal appearance in his films.  Michael Moore himself acts as the "everyday man" in his films; appearing as a normal person rather than an uppity director.  His portrayal of this everyman helped to give his work an air of groundedness and relatability.

While this trend worked in his early films, the repetition of his own involvement has grinded many of his viewers nerves.  His films became more about himself and his opinions than the issues and logic behind them.  His films reach a point where he becomes not only this everyman, but he becomes highly-successful filmmaker Michael Moore.  As his films became more topical, many critics claim that his success had lead him to become snobby and arrogant, and it becomes truly visible in the parody on his famed "Roger and Me", known as "Michael Moore Hates America".  The film, by Mike Wilson, attempts to emulate Moore's earlier film where he attempts to get an interview with CEO of General Motors Roger Bonham Smith.  Wilson attempts to interview Moore, while also exposing some of the discrepancies of Moore's earlier work, from manipulation of data and information, to staging of events and processes, in order to fit Moore's ideology and thesis of Moore's films.

The egotistical character that Moore has become, being a prominent left-wing political activist, has turned many of his films sour.  His personal appearance and brashness, while entertaining from time to time, has spoiled the ideological approach his films take towards difficult issues.  The brashness comes off as arrogance, and this turns the viewer off to his perspective.

Raging Bull and Fear in Film

When you talk about fear in film, it is typically a result of design. The characters, lighting, and camera angles are arranged in a way to intentionally strike fear in you. The character’s alone in the house with the killer they’ve been running from the whole time, or something along those lines. These scenes, even when they work effectively, are fear of what is to come. You aren’t afraid of the teenage girl walking down the hallways of her dark house, you’re afraid of what may lurk around the corner. Rarely, if ever, is the audience in fear of what is happening in that moment. One of the few instances in which I felt legitimate fear while watching a scene was, funnily enough, not in a horror movie.

Jake LaMotta, portrayed in an instantly iconic performance by Robert DeNiro, is a violent man. His work is violent. His home life is violent. His sex is violent. And up until this point, it has done well for him. But as the film Raging Bull goes on, directed by Martin Scorcese in what may very well be his masterwork, what use to empower Jake and be his profession starts to undo him. His compulsions and drives for violence and self-gratification, which initially rewarded him, slowly start to undo him. He’s no longer respected as a heavyweight boxer. He has lost his family. And his relationship with his brother has been torn asunder by his ego and pride. What was once a proud, well-respected man at the peak of physical fitness has been reduced to owning a shitty bar in Miami. He’s overweight and reciting crappy comedy monologues to himself. Soon enough his wife divorces him. Then, to top it all off, he gets arrested for sleeping with an underage girl. He’s thrown in jail like some common sleaze ball.

We have never seen Jake weak. Hell, we haven’t seen him up until this point be anything but a brute.  He is nothing now. His ego, pride, greed have nothing to hold up to anymore. All he has is his violence. His animalistic fury. And he uses it.

“WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY”

                 When I watched this movie for the first time, I cowered in my seat while watching this part. Knives held in the dark, creepy men in masks, long dark hallways. Whatever. That's all technique, not storytelling. But this is pure unbridled anger mixed with fear and self-loathing. I cannot quite articulate what about this scene sticks inside my gut so much. But it’s haunting. It’s a man at his lowest point in his life. When he is stripped of it all, this is how he acts. And that’s terrifying to bear witness to. Surely more fear inducing than any thriller or horror movie I've ever scene. It causes me to worry about man and what he is capable of. 

                An amazing scene, an amazing performance, an amazing film.