movie stuffs

[duchess_of_pie]

so on friday, gabe and i tried to get into hollywood to see a screening of the original "texas chainsaw massacre" with live commentary by the director. but we ended up having plans with a friend.

then, yesterday, the same theatre was showing "the seven voyages of sinbad" with live commentary by ray harryhausen. ray! harryhausen! you know, the claymation master behind "sinbad" and "jason and the argonauts" and "clash of the titans?" i had no idea the man was still alive!

well, by the time we got there, it was sold out. but ray was across the street at a bookstore for a signing before the movie. and we got to see him there. didn't get to meet him, as he was making some purchases and rushing out to the theatre. he's very old. lots of liver spots. slow walker. but very tall. the little bookstore was covered in his artwork, and he seemed pleased about that.

so we came home and watched "sicko" instead.

REVIEWS OF THE DUCHESS: SICKO (dvd)

michael moore does it again. and it's horrifying. he takes a look at universal health care and compares it to our own. the quality and coverage of our healthcare ranks #66 in the world...right above slovenia. we have shorter life-expectancy and higher infant death rates than any country in the western world.

in france, you work 35 hours a week, get 5 weeks of paid vacation minimum--one more for honeymoons, a day for moving, and as much time as you need for birthing and cancer recovery, all paid. and healthcare is FREE. they interview a girl in canada who basically says, "you hear about how much they have to pay in america and it's really hard to imagine or comprehend because i've never had to pay for medical care. i don't have any idea what that's like."

there's several stories of people who die because of insurance declines or issues, and those who go bankrupt and have to live in their kid's basements just because they got sick and lost their homes. he takes three 9/11 rescue workers to cuba for treatment--and they are treated, free--because insurance in our country won't cover them.

and, once you're really sick, the insurance companies will find any and every reason NOT to cover you, or demand back anything that they've paid for you.

what the fuck is wrong with our country?

if i ever get really sick, i'm moving to france. or england. or canada. or cuba. anywhere but here, where they put you in a taxi and dump you on the sidewalk outside of a free clinic if you can't pay your medical bills. jesus.

anyway. michael's made yet another film that should be required watching for american voters. god. so horrifying. so sad. so fucked. up.

Comments

[ribsfro.livejournal.com]

I loved that movie. I saw it in the theatres and on dvd (that reminds me someone has my dvd). I just love that it shows stories of it working. I mean I know that it doesn't work everywhere and that there is a huge waiting list in certain places for certain times and certain things, but still it CAN work.

I'm not sure its the best option but what america has now sucks more. I think there still is a better solution, but I'm not sure what. you can ask Beau though and he will go off and give you the ways he thinks it should be. Its kind of in the middle of us and frace etc but I forget now.

it is a must see and I wish more people would watch his movies. I think Sicko is the best of all.

[kurosawa.livejournal.com]

dude, I wanna move to France.

yes and no.

[(Anonymous)]

michael moore is great, but flawed. He is obviously on the right side, sanity, and he can be very funny and smart, but in almost all of his work there are always the moments when I think he just goes into crap land, and it hurts all the other material he has in the project. He knows its propaganda, it's set up to fight for a side, and counter arguments are left out, and that's fine, but I think he intentionally goes batty in just one or two places so the work is more open to criticism, and thus controversy, and thus publicity, and while I don't think he's looking for the buck, it's still commercialized descent from the establishment. My argument against Sicko was that I hoped for a lot more. This was my least favorite of his movies and from the subject material it should have been his best. I was hoping for more stories of our broken corrupt health care and how those were connected to flaws in the system, but I got a lot of shaking fire fighter's hands in Cuba, which to me didn't have anything to do with Health care. So instead of spending his time looking at real problems and solutions he was just setting himself up for the anti-Moore news story he wanted, showing how Moore made a Dirty Communistic movie about Cuba... better see it, to love it or hate it. ... I think the health care system is broken in a lot of ways that he didn't get into at all, and I give him negative points for that.