The documentary film by Michael Moore which fiercely attacks the Bush administration's handling of terrorism and the Iraq war, opens June 25 nationwide. Disney prohibited its Miramax subsidiary from distributing the movie in the United States due to the political controversy surrounding the film. The movie won awards at the Cannes film festival.

The movie's trailer shows Moore confronting a member of Congress on the steps of the Capitol, and members of bin Laden's family being spirited out of the US supposedly with preferential treatment by the Bush administration. We see a convention for businesses hoping to profit from the war which is billed as "good for business, bad for the people." Simultaneously funny and horrifying vignettes of Bush, Ashcroft, and other leaders unwittingly indict themselves in their own words.

Moore's critics claim the film shows a "skewed portrait of America" and that Moore is "brilliant at creating false impressions without uttering a false word." Other critics claim that Moore is a "liar" and that he "fabricates" facts to suit his political ambitions. If true, Moore isn't the only one who can twist the language to suggest things that he doesn't say outright.

In an NBC interview with Moore, he doesn't claim to be a journalist, and he doesn't attempt to be impartial. He admits to "setting out to poke a sharp stick in the eye of the Bush administration," but argues that his movie is built on facts and images that have been withheld from the American public. Moore says his primary motivation was, to quote Abraham Lincoln, "to give the people the facts and the Republic will be safe."

Documentaries appear to be the vehicle of choice to get non-mainstream views some airtime in an age of media consolidation and corporate control of most news sources. "The Corporation," a documentary by Joel Bakan, argues that people do evil things in their corporate personas that they would never do in their private lives.

Some would argue that historically, governments have been more Evil with a capital E than corporations. Michael Moore seems to be saying that the collaboration of government and corporate interests is the most toxic of all.

[Update 6/20/04 -- A NYT review checks the facts, and finds that "the central assertions of fact in 'Fahrenheit 9/11' are supported by the public record.... that said, Mr. Moore's fact checkers do not view the film as straight reportage...'this is an op-ed piece, it's not a news report.'" Anticipating a frontal assault by Bush supporters, Moore has assembled a team of fact-checkers to go through "every single word of this film -- literally every word." Moore also has a team of lawyers to defend against libel, saying, "If they persist in telling lies, knowingly telling a lie with malice, then I'll take them to court."]

[Update 6/21/04 -- Christopher Hitchens (slate.com) rips the movie as "dishonest and demagogic" and "utterly propagandistic." Much of the critique focuses on purported inconsistencies with this movie and statements Moore has made in the past: "from being accused of overlooking too many warnings ... the administration is now lavishly taunted for issuing too many." A related article claims that Moore's team of lawyers will have a hard time prosecuting libel, since Moore holds the movie to be an "op-ed piece" and his own opinion: "I'm not trying to pretend that this is some sort of, you know, fair and balanced work of journalism."]