Format: DVD from NetFlix on rockin’ flatscreen.
With the exception of Roger and Me, I always come to the films of Michael Moore with some trepidation. I can’t change the truth that Moore is an excellent filmmaker. He has a unique voice for a documentarian, but he’s also a polemicist. If you say that you like Michael Moore’s films, you’re suddenly a Whole Foods-shopping pinko communist. If you say that you hate Michael Moore’s films, you are a right-wing religious fundamentalist Nazi. While certainly true in some cases, it’s not true in all. Bowling for Columbine suffers the same problem. Moore is so polarizing that it’s easy to miss the actual message of the film.
As the title indicates, this is a film about America’s fascination with guns and the terrible cost that that fascination sometimes forces us to pay. The film came out several years after the shooting incident in Littleton, CO, but even if it came out now, “Columbine” as a word has changed its meaning in the American lexicon. It’s not a flower anymore; it’s a high school in Colorado. Moore is completely up front with why this is such an interesting topic for him. Within the first few minutes of the film, he talks about his own history with firearms and his membership in the NRA. Let me repeat that: super pinko leftie Michael Moore is literally a card-carrying member of the National Rifle Association, or at least was when this film was made.
