Moore of the same

Michael Moore, the adenoidal apostle of American democratic reform, is at it again with Capitalism: A Love Story, his latest assault on the rich, powerful and corrupt. While the film focuses primarily on the recent financial crisis and recovery stimulus package enacted by the U.S. Congress, it is a good deal more wistful and nostalgic than Sicko, Fahrenheit 9/11 or Bowling for Columbine.

Equal parts tutorial and political theater, Capitalism is also intensely autobiographical. To illustrate the effects of unchecked greed in the United States and abroad, Moore takes us back to his childhood, painting his upbringing in working-class Flint, Michigan, as an idyllic example of the good life enjoyed by a robust and productive American middle class after World War II.

Of course, Moore's film is not a celebration of capitalism. The director chalks up the plenty enjoyed by the masses in the postwar years in the States to the annihilation of Japanese and European industrial capacity, and reminds viewers that even deserving workers were profiting from destruction and death. The smug recounting of the golden years of American capitalism turns into a smug polemic against President Ronald Reagan, Don Regan (the former Merrill Lynch CEO who, as Reagan's treasury secretary, would "turn the bull loose" on the interests of the working class), both Bush presidents and a host of others, culminating in the rather convincing proposition that the "bailout" of corporate interests by Congress amounts to one final parting act of class war and white-collar theft in the waning days of lame-duck Republican rule.

However laudable in many respects, the director is a difficult filmmaker to embrace whole-heartedly. Moore's oeuvre is problematic at best, even for those inclined to agree with his political point of view. Being a godless liberal myself, I tend to agree with most of what Moore has to say about the evils of capitalism and conservatism, even as I tend to regret the ways in which he goes about saying it. The agitator within his considerable carcass is righteous in its indignation, but the antics employed in the name of cinematic activism are decidedly hit-and-miss.

Capitalism is no exception. Moore's return to the wasteland that is the remains of Flint's industrial landscape (with his elderly father, a man who worked in the GM factories there for decades, along to act as tour guide) is affecting and sincere. Also affecting is his coverage of the struggles of laid-off workers in Chicago, who stage a lock-in, asserting their collective strength and ultimately prevailing in their battle against the bosses.

But when he veers into an aside about the opposition of some random religious figures to wanton greed - equating, in effect, capitalism with sin - it's silly and transparent. His attempts to literally storm the corporate offices of moneyed interests to "collect" on behalf of the American taxpayer are futile and yawn-inducing in all but one respect: They portray Moore in the role of political hero, a modern Quixote tilting at private power, a warrior for the workers waving his flag of revolution from the barricades.

The trouble is that no matter how informative and creative (never mind indefatigable) Moore may have proved himself to be since he burst on the scene with Roger & Me in 1989, he is not now and never has been a romantic or particularly inspiring figure. The image of him tromping around the banking district like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, attempting to wrap whole skyscrapers in police tape (they're crime scenes, don't you know) is not only ridiculous but also off-putting and unentertaining.

James Scanlon can be reached at
features@praguepost.com