Capitalism: A Love Story

Michael Moore has made one of his best documentaries so far, showing how the criminal Wall Street bankers performed their "financial coup d'état" in 2008.To begin with, under Reagan, they pushed the deregulation process. One of the best scenes of this movie is the chairman of Merrill Lynch saying to Reagan while he was actually delivering a speech : "you have to speed it up". It is one of those very rare instants when you actually see who is acting and who is in control ! After the Wall Street boys got their deregulation, they invented all kind of new ways to make money in their insane casino, one of them being called "derivatives". Moore asked some Wall Street gurus, including a Harvard professor, to have us explained what a "derivative" is, and neither of them succeeded. And that's exactly the point. Make it complicated, and project high returns, and no questions will be asked.The banks made a home run. They got in trouble, but taxpayers were invited to pay for it. In 2008, Bush used the old trick of 9/11 again, and used *fear* to orchestrate what Moore calls a "financial coup d'état". Two months before election, we were told by the mass media that "the economy would collapse" if banks were not saved. That was a major fraud. Through a backdoor agreement involving the president and the president-to-be, an agreement was reached to inject $700 billion of tax money in the criminal banks.In the meantime, people have lost their houses, and are still losing them, at a flabbergasting rate of every 7.5 seconds ! Moore makes an important point when showing how the middle class lived 30 to 40 years ago : one wage-earner was enough to support a whole family, own a house, have a car, take yearly vacations, have health care, could rely on a pension, etc. This model looks from a distant past, although it was part... of our childhood ! Wages have been in steady decline since the 80's, and pensions and health care have been privatized. In the process, the middle class is virtually ruined.Citibank calls what's left of the US democracy a "plutonomy". Following their definition this is an economy "powered by and for the benefit of the wealthy". Following the same memo, the top 1 % of the American households has more wealth than the bottom 95% combined. Moore also highlights the fact that this memo considers "the most potent and mayor threat is societies demanding a more "equitable" share of the wealth".If the economic system fails and if the democracy is not working at all, then maybe it's time to go back to the essence of honest business and real democracy. One of the solutions highlighted by Michael Moore are cooperatives, where the pay is fairly distributed, and decisions are made together. As complementary reading, I would recommend John Abram's  Companies We Keep (Revised & Expanded): Employee Ownership and the Business of Community and Place .The Extras on this DVD - with some interesting interviews - highlight another solution : CSA (community supported agriculture). The way out of insanity is definitively empowering local communities.

This is vintage Michael Moore. Perhaps less focused than "Roger & Me", "Farenheit 9/11", or "Sicko", Moore, nonetheless, makes his point in this semi-documentary, a genre of which he is a master. Released in 2009, it opens with a disclaimer from an unsmiling narrator warning anyone with a heart condition or is easily upset, or is in the company of impressionable young children, to leave the theater immediately for one's own health and safety. It next cuts to a clip from an Encyclopaedia Britannica Films documentary entitled "Life in Ancient Rome", most likely produced in the mid to late 1940's, and intended as an audio-visual supplement in high schools of that period as a part of the then traditional instructional pedagogy. Anyone familiar with Edward Gibbon's six volume classic of the late eighteenth century entitled "The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" with all of its attendant irony will enjoy the next several minutes of film as its intercuts between the rise and fall of Rome, and clips of the principals of the George W. Bush administration as they preside over the end of "American Exceptionalism". GM and G.W. have been previous targets of Mr. Moore, so he is on familiar ground when he returns to his native Flint, Michigan to show b&w film clips of the GM plant there in its glory days during the 1930's and '40's, and scenes of a crumbling community today after the departure of GM. During the opening titles of the film we see actural footage of a security camera in a bank as it records an armed robbery in progress while "Louie, Louie" plays in the background. Much of the remaining footage deals with the big banks, Wall Street and capitalism in general and what has resulted in recent years in, or to this country from an unbridled laissez faire (literally: "let people do as they choose") form of capitalism. Moore has used his form of story telling to make the same point as writers like Andrew J. Bacevich made in his book of 2008 entitled "The Limits of Power". The message: "Beware of what you ask for!" What you get is likely not going to be what you asked for. He reminds us, through interviews with three Catholic clerics, that Jesus did not advocate capitalism, though he clererly overdubs an old movie about Jesus where the latter appears, or sounds, like he is ardently advocating this economic nodel. There is the implied suggestion that the gospel message of the New Testament and the "Gospel of Success" that is preached in many venues today are neither synonymous nor compatible. Moore, it should be noted, is a practicing Catholic. He also makes a trip to the National Archives in a vain search for mention of the word "capitalism" in the U.S. Constitution. The film ends with with quotations from some of our founding fathers, e.g. "I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies" ... Thomas Jefferson, 1816; or "Property monopolized or in the possession of a few is a curse to mankind" ... John Adams, 1765. As the quotes scroll by one hears the voice of Merle Haggard singing an old Woody Guthrie classic "Jesus Christ." If you are one who can be provoked into an excerise of the brain called "independenty thought", then this is a movie for you, but for the easily excitable, be sure and take your blood pressure medication before inserting the disk into your DVD player.

Having watched the majority of Michael Moore's documentary films, I can agreeably say that I am a fan of his work. His quest is unending, his approach is indomitable, his technique is righteously confrontational, his range is wide. "Capitalism: A love story" (2010) comes from his more recent, and one could say, more mature and rounded efforts. Indeed, the cover to this DVD state that "Capitalism: A love story" is "Moore's magnum opus". There is, however, and fortunately, more to come from the Moore store.Moore employs all of his characteristic film-making traits to produce what is, in the view of the Huffington Post, "The most powerful and urgent political film of our time". Reviews agree that this documentary "is Moore's best yet"..., that he is at "the top of his game"..., that his work "is funny and powerful"..., and that Michael Moore "is a highly sophisticated film-maker". Having now seen most of Moore's film productions, I would not hesitate to agree with these opinions.This film has much in common with Moore's first documentary "The Big One", in that it targets the rich "fat-cats" of capitalist USA and the fact that the policies of these owners of capital are responsible for loss of homes and jobs as they pursue their own greed and power. In his indomitable and intrepid way, Moore "digs the dirt" on capitalism's modus operandi as he interview those who have been evicted from their homes, factories and small businesses that have been foreclosed, professional people reliant on food stamps, as well as factory workers who refuse to go without a fight in the face of their job losses.But Moore's humorous and populist-style film is not only, nor even mainly, focused on the negative - it contains a message of hope. Moore's compassion for ordinary people is as big as his physique.Moore's positive message is focused on the strength and endeavour of the American worker, his or her ability to adapt and prosper, despite the ravages wrought by rampant and unsupervised capitalism. The documentary capitalizes on the "populist anger that has been sweeping the (American) nation." Indeed, Capitalism in the USA has met an awesome opponent in the person of Michael Moore.

I remember watching the Enron documentary "The smartest guys in the room" several years ago and thinking this was a potential wake up call as it highlighted the britleness of capatalism and western ideology. Fast forward half a decade and this is almost like watching the consequence of a car wreck that you saw coming when you gave the keys of your Ferrari to a drunken teenager. If you are pro capatalism you will no doubt argue that this is just conspiracy theorist propognda. However as time passes Moores work such as Roger & Me, Faranheit, Columbine and now Capatalism gets more and more relevent. His ability to make potentially boring subject matter intreseting & relevent to the masses is superb. Watching the right wing media steamroll & control the mass populations sub concious almost seems farcical but after watching this film you will notice it every day. Fox News coverage for example is almost Joseph Goeballs like in its bias. Along with Faranheit 911 I would encourage everyone to watch this film, its a modern classic.

Moore starts good where he gave a history of where capitalism was that -the middle class , free markets , and then went to bank corruption with the aid of corrupt government .He gives some accounts of the wrongs of corporatism , not capitalism which is better than failed socialism which he seemed to support in USA with the election of the lord and savior obama , which has been a disaster with massive debt , failed gov backed companies like cylindra , rising lay offs , companies burdened with greater regulations etc , and this before we talk about socialized medicine run by the gov who cannot even get a web site to sign up to start .There are wrongs with corporatism , but even that is better than socialism .

The best Micheal Moore dvd ive seen yet!Gives a good overall picture of what capitalism is and where its heading!This is very serious people and we must start using our powers as the majority that has been used for decades to make the rich richer and clapped and bowed while we did it.Waken up to the propaganda all around you.If you don't trust the media or your choices of government its time to clean out the closet and start again.FARELY! and to people who say but what's your alternative?There are plent of way's to make where we live a more even/fair society without making poor people pay for rich peoples mistakes.Please look around you.This isn't some kind of conspiracy,conspiacy's don't have credible evidence.

You won't believe what stuff has been going on in the financial world when you see this movie. It's unbelieveable that these "people" for want of a better word got away with all of this. A compelling, must-see documentary for anyone and everyone. Moore displays the fallout of the 2008 crash with horrific truth. Companies making money off dead workers, being made work double the time for half the pay, selling Florida condo's for 25 cents on the dollar, and how great America really is... you don't want to miss this, believe me. Find out how capitalism rules and democracy drools in this fantastic investigation into the workings of our globalised, finacial world.