BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE (Michael Moore, 2002) R

Reviewed: October 19th, 2002

More than a bit dazed and thoroughly ass-kicked, I stumbled outta Michael Moore's spelunking of American violence -- which is among the most pertinent, forceful, devastating and thought-provoking films I've ever seen -- invigorated, confused, disturbed, depressed, excited and sad. From the lobby, while I was still trying to shake my head clear, I saw a man shoot open his umbrella less than a foot outside the theater doors. Strange, I thought. It doesn't even look like it's raining anymore (earlier it'd been pouring). I stepped outside myself. Dry as a bone. How frickin' apt. I'd just experienced a film which posits America's Most Violent Western Country In The World status as linked to our nation's tragicomically exaggerated (courtesy of the media, particularly the television media) sense of fear/paranoia and here was a man so pathetically scared of getting a few god damn drops of water on himself he impulsively deployed umbrellas when it wasn't even raining.

Walking back home, the brisk, autumn, weekend air making me sentimental for a simpler style of fall movie-going long past (a nice, young time for me when writing a review wasn't a consideration), I stared and stared at the ever-changing, glistening NYC nightscape, continual icons of a city I adore so much, the only city I've ever known, a city that still, all these years later, manages to fill me with awe and admiration. And then it occurred to me -- for the very first time in my life -- perhaps I should just leave this fucking country.

Maybe then the best thing I can say about Moore's Bowling for Columbine -- not a documentary, but something far more vital: a freewheeling, assaulting, argument-raising inquiry -- is it genuinely made me ashamed to be an American.

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