Page 1 of 8 1234 ... LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 80

Thread: Michael Moore's Acceptance Speech

  1. #1
    Infested Cats's Avatar Mike Victory
    Join Date
    Sep 2002
    Location
    Brooklyn, NY
    Age
    38
    Posts
    1,146
    I love Michael Moore, and his views.
    His acceptance speech, i thought, took a lot of balls, and was absoluteley brilliant:

    Whoa. On behalf of our producers Kathleen Glynn and Michael Donovan from Canada, I'd like to thank the Academy for this. I have invited my fellow documentary nominees on the stage with us, and we would like to — they're here in solidarity with me because we like nonfiction. We like nonfiction and we live in fictitious times. We live in the time where we have fictitious election results that elects a fictitious president. We live in a time where we have a man sending us to war for fictitious reasons. Whether it's the fictition of duct tape or fictition of orange alerts we are against this war, Mr. Bush. Shame on you, Mr. Bush, shame on you. And any time you got the Pope and the Dixie Chicks against you, your time is up. Thank you very much.
    Also, watch this video where the press is asking him questions: http://mfile.akamai.com/8629/asf/clips.dow...ature2_300k.asx

  2. The Drawing Room   -   #2
    is he american? r u american?

  3. The Drawing Room   -   #3
    kAb's Avatar Poster
    Join Date
    Dec 2002
    Posts
    2,583
    hmm, i thought it was a bad speech...

  4. The Drawing Room   -   #4
    Originally posted by kAb@24 March 2003 - 23:34
    hmm, i thought it was a bad speech...
    I thought it took a lot a balls to come out with that statement in these troubled times. He showed at lot more courage than the so-called "anti-war couple" Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon. They claim to oppose the war but when the opportunity was there they bottled it and thought only of their careers. Whores!!! I am hugely sorry that the late, great Bill Hicks isn't with us anymore. He'd definately have something to say and wouldn't give a fuck about saying it!!! Bowling for Columbine was the best fucking movie nominated for an Oscar ( in any category ), it was funny, poignant, sad, angry, scary and utterly compelling. If you haven't seen it - WATCH IT NOW!!!!
    Signature removed

  5. The Drawing Room   -   #5
    Forum Star
    Join Date
    Nov 2002
    Location
    Belgium
    Posts
    2,368
    Originally posted by soopaman@25 March 2003 - 00:51
    Bowling for Columbine was the best fucking movie nominated for an Oscar ( in any category ), it was funny, poignant, sad, angry, scary and utterly compelling. If you haven't seen it - WATCH IT NOW!!!!
    ... and 'Roger and me', and all his other films.


    Thanks, IC, I just knew you were going to post this. B)

  6. The Drawing Room   -   #6
    ClubDiggler's Avatar Poster
    Join Date
    Feb 2003
    Location
    Manhattan, New York
    Posts
    183
    Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

    Don't agree with him though!!!

    B)

  7. The Drawing Room   -   #7
    Infested Cats's Avatar Mike Victory
    Join Date
    Sep 2002
    Location
    Brooklyn, NY
    Age
    38
    Posts
    1,146
    Good article about Moore from Time.com:

    Monday, Mar. 24, 2003
    Shame on You, Mr. Moore! Shame on You!
    The 'Bowling for Columbine' auteur had every qualification to make his antiwar speech at the Oscars. That didn't make it any less stupid
    By JAMES PONIEWOZIK
    It may not be the most popular thing to say today, but Michael Moore had not only every right but every legitimate qualification to make an antiwar speech — "Shame on you, Mr. Bush! Shame on you!" — at the 2003 Oscars. The standard reason to discount political speeches from Hollywood celebs, after all, is that we don't give a crap about their political thoughts: their job is to stand up, look pretty, collect their $25 million and give US and People something to write about.

    One can hardly say that about Michael Moore. In fact, there is not much reason that anyone cares about Michael Moore except for his political opinions. From "Roger and Me" through his Oscar-winning "Bowling for Columbine", his movie are less documentaries in the usual sense than artfully constructed and often hilariously funny editorials. Agree with him or not, he is, unlike Susan Sarandon, nothing if he is not a professional commentator; and thus it was not inherently stupid for him to make his speech.

    No. His speech was stupid for entirely different reasons.

    The first is that — and this is a characteristic flaw of Moore's movies — it was a shrill harangue that would make a person ashamed even for agreeing with it. By starting off his screed by attacking the legitimacy of George W. Bush's election, he committed the same mistake as too many leaders of the antiwar movement, such as the leaders of ANSWER: he couldn't resist the temptation to lump his antiwar stance in with the rest of his portfolio of grievances. As a result, he made a speech guaranteed to alienate even many people who are also against the war.

    If Moore really wants to end the war — and not just boost the spirits of his Upper West Side neighbors — then mightn't he also want to win over people who oppose the war and yet don't believe that Bush is an illegimate president swept into office by skullduggery? Is he so insulated that he doesn't realize people like that exist? Or are people like that simply not simon-pure enough for him to want them in his antiwar movement?

    That's the really annoying thing about Moore's speech. Moore often casts himself as a populist, and sometimes he's even convincing. He often makes a strong case against other progressives who out of touch with the hoi polloi — who can't lower themselves to listen to talk radio, can't identify a NASCAR driver or country singer, can't in any sense understand how the mass of America lives and thinks. This kind of liberal attitude, he has rightly argued, has kept the Left from building broad-based movements. But Moore's own clubby, we-all-know-Bush-is-a-liar attitude suggests that he's not interested in a broad-based antiwar movement.

    I'm going to get a lot of e-mail from people who believe Bush stole the election in Florida, but before you press "send," at least consider this. A lot of smart people agree with you. But if someone disagrees with you, are they not worth allying with against the war? Would you rather have a war in Iraq than pass up a chance to bring up Florida again?

    The remainder of the speech was no improvement. There was the general hectoring and finger-wagging — and I don't mean finger-wagging figuratively; the man literally thrust his finger at the camera. A man with Moore's sense of history has no excuse not to realize that makes him look like a crackpot dictator shouting a harangue from the balcony. And while his last line about Bush being in trouble because the Pope and the Dixie Chicks are against him was funny, it was funny because most people don't take the opinions of music groups seriously. Kind of like the opinions of Oscar winners.

    There's been a lot of piling on against celebrities who speak out against the war. Frankly, I sympathize with the celebs. We spend our entire lives paying inordinate attention to the pronouncements of celebrities on everything from art to family to fashion. Suddenly we're offended because they also care about politics?

    But there's a special reason to resent a political speech at the Oscars — and it's not just bias against Hollywood liberals. (Everyone considers Arnold Schwarzenegger a nitwit for holding forth politically too, and he's conservative.) Call it the Panhandler Syndrome. A speaker like Moore is like a beggar in a New York City subway car. Even people who give to charity and the homeless resent this kind of panhandling, because it takes advantage of a captive audience. It's not like you can just jump out onto the tracks if you don't want to be bothered.

    Likewise, a proselytizing celeb like Moore is essentially hijacking our attention, saying that if you want to find out who won Best Director, you're damn well going to sit there and hear me out on world affairs. All the more reason for him to be, if not apolitical, reasonable and respectful of people who disagree with him, or agree with him only, say, 60%.

    When I e-mailed an esteemed colleague my thoughts about Moore earlier today, he wrote back with a reasonable defense: Why should a progressive like Moore have to be all gentle and NPR-nuanced when there are so many Limbaughs and O'Reillys out there? The reason: More people in America identify as conservative than liberal, like it or not. So lefties who want to accomplish anything outside Santa Monica and Manhattan need moderate support even more than their righty analogues do.

    That's assuming, of course, that Michael Moore actually wants to expand the antiwar movement. Maybe he simply wants to excite his amen corner — that is, people who might rush out and see, buy or rent his movies. That may be good enough for him. It will certainly be good enough for his career. It should not be good enough for anyone who wants to create an antiwar movement that could actually stop a war.

  8. The Drawing Room   -   #8
    Skillian's Avatar T H F C f a n BT Rep: +1
    Join Date
    Dec 2002
    Posts
    1,748
    Just wanted to say I was SO happy to see that award go to Bowling For Columbine - every thread that has mentioned it on this forum I have urged people to see it - the good thing about this is now maybe more people will.

    And thanks to infested Cats for that video and article - both very interesting and I probably wouldn't have got to see them if you hadn't posted - thanks.

  9. The Drawing Room   -   #9
    Poster
    Join Date
    Jan 2003
    Location
    Portugal
    Posts
    853
    His speech reminded me of those guys who go to the Howard Stern show and want all the attention to them, so they start shouting in order to get it.

  10. The Drawing Room   -   #10
    kAb's Avatar Poster
    Join Date
    Dec 2002
    Posts
    2,583
    i loved the movie. i'll say that.

    but it was utterly biased.

    When it said "Osama bin laden uses his expert CIA training on september 11th" (or whatever), it was the stupidest thing it could have said. And the numbers of the other things that the U.S. did were much higher than what the REAL numbers were.

    He can be funny and is a good director, but he is very anti-establishment, and it disgusts me.

Page 1 of 8 1234 ... LastLast

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •