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Thread: "Sicko" - new Michael Moore film

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    "Sicko" - new Michael Moore film

    Michael Moore's new film is called "Sicko" - here's the blurb that Daily Variety is using on their review: "Three/Four [the website says three, the email they sent says four] years after winning Cannes' top prize for "Fahrenheit 9/11," docu helmer and agent provocateur Michael Moore returns to the Croisette with more polemics as performance art in "Sicko," an entertaining and affecting dissection of the American health care industry that documents how it benefits the few at the expense of the many. Pic's tone alternates between comedy and outrage, as it compares the U.S system of care to other countries. Given Moore's celebrity and fan base, plus heightened awareness of pic resulting from the heated battle between left and right already ongoing in cyberspace, returns look to be extremely healthy."

    Anyone planning on going? I don't care for Michael Moore, but given everything I've heard about him, I'd be curious to hear from people who see the movie who know the health industry well enough to know what he got right and what he might be stretching/making up.

    Not sure if this works if you're not a subscriber, but here's the Variety review.

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    Hacker, nonmammaltarian, Warrior Andrew's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by cstephens View Post
    Not sure if this works if you're not a subscriber, but here's the Variety review.
    It does.
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    I don't think I am going to see it. I like a good documentary, but Michael Moore's movies are filled with fallacies.

    I just can't watch his movies and take him seriously. He is kind of a joke.


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    Read Everything-Assume Nothing GusMan's Avatar
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    It may be interesting to see on video, but I will take its content with a grain of salt.

    I consider his stuff to be too political in nature. I mean, Bowling for Columbine was rather interesting. However F9/11 was way too political and filled with way too much blamestorming to be interesting, let alone informative.

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    One of the things I've heard about Sicko was that Moore blames one Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton for being in the "take" of HMO's and pharmaceutical companies. I'd like to know how that will go down in the Clinton camp, though.

    Raymond in Sacramento, CA

  7. #6

    Wow, Moore takes a shot at The Queen Liberal Bee herself? I wonder who he's trying to impress this time.

    I agree anything Moore does can't be taken seriously. I think a word coined by the short-lived animated series "The Critic" is perfect for Moore's movies. They are a combination of fantasy and crap: "Fantacrap".

    I'm just sorry perfectly good film stock was utterly wasted under the direction of Michael Moore. It could have been put to much better use for something like, say, Manos 2.


  8. #7

    I watched this last night, and I found it very, very interesting. Particularly when I read that Hilary was "bought off" so to speak, by the insurance companies.

    I spent 6 months working for Premera Blue Cross at one time, and I just couldn't take it. I walked away with the definite feeling that insurance companies are crooks. The loopholes that they use to get around paying for people's medical benefits are absolutely disgusting.

    I had to tell people that preventative MRI's and exams and mammograms weren't covered. I had to tell people medicine for their kids with cancer was not covered because Premera considered it "experimental."

    I had to leave that job because I spent at least 60% of my day on the phone with people who were either irate because their care was not covered, or worse, sobbing into the phone because they had lost all hope.

    Worst job in the world. I usually find Michael Moore pretty insufferable, but from my personal experience, this documentary was pretty accurate.


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    Quote Originally Posted by Peachy View Post
    I watched this last night, and I found it very, very interesting.
    Thanks for sharing an insider's experience.

    No one would want to hear my insurance horror stories, but it's nice to know that I'm not alone in paying a ton of money for an inadequate system.
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  10. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Peachy View Post
    Worst job in the world. I usually find Michael Moore pretty insufferable, but from my personal experience, this documentary was pretty accurate.
    Funny, that's exactly what my friend who recommended I watch this movie told me when he discovered what I'm currently experiencing--that the movie is pretty accurate. I haven't been able to bring myself to watch it, though, because I'm angry enough about my own situation as it is. I've also worked for an insurance company (house counsel), for insurance defense law firms, and my clients are all insurance fraud investigators. Some of the things I've seen them do to people just make me want to puke.

    Peachy, would you recommend the movie to someone actually going through a lot of health insurance issues right now? Or am I better off sticking with my Days of Our Lives?

  11. #10

    Really, I think it's very imformative. I'd reccommend it to anyone. I'm not anti-capitolism. In fact, my political views are pretty conservative. But I don't think people's healthcare should be a business for profit.

    It's funny, because my stint at PBC was about a year ago, and I would come home literally every day all upset, feeling so horrible for these people and I would tell my boyfriend these stories, and I think he thought I was exaggerating. And then he watched Sicko with me and they were interviewing employees of health insurance companies, and he was looking at me like "Ahh, now I get it."

    Basically, we were trained to look for EVERY POSSIBLE loophole to get around paying for somebody's treatment. And if we didn't find it at the start of the process, somebody would find it after they'd had the procedure, and then these elderly people, and people with sick kids would have these astronomical bills. It's disgusting.

    And people get angry. They have a right to. They cry. They have a right to that as well. You feel so hopeless for them, and it's all so some CEOs can be rich.


  12. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Peachy View Post
    Really, I think it's very imformative. I'd reccommend it to anyone. I'm not anti-capitolism. In fact, my political views are pretty conservative. But I don't think people's healthcare should be a business for profit.

    It's funny, because my stint at PBC was about a year ago, and I would come home literally every day all upset, feeling so horrible for these people and I would tell my boyfriend these stories, and I think he thought I was exaggerating. And then he watched Sicko with me and they were interviewing employees of health insurance companies, and he was looking at me like "Ahh, now I get it."

    Basically, we were trained to look for EVERY POSSIBLE loophole to get around paying for somebody's treatment. And if we didn't find it at the start of the process, somebody would find it after they'd had the procedure, and then these elderly people, and people with sick kids would have these astronomical bills. It's disgusting.

    And people get angry. They have a right to. They cry. They have a right to that as well. You feel so hopeless for them, and it's all so some CEOs can be rich.
    I was reminded of the scene in The Incredibles where Bob is working at an insurance company, tells the little old lady how to get around the system, and then ends up being taken to task for his clients 'knowing how to work the system' by his boss.

    Except that this sort of thing happens in real life; it's not just an animated movie exaggeration (OK, well, maybe when Bob pops the boss through the wall...). I think it's an utter embarrassment that our country (mis)handles health care in such a way. We could, we should do better for each other.

    There's a really valid line in a U2 song: The rich stay healthy, and the sick stay poor.

    I've spent a week listening to my elderly parents talk about the cost of their medications, the numerous trips to the doctors and hospitals for their various ailments, the insurance that they have, the supplemental insurance they have, and their hopes that, when it's all said and done, they don't have to sell their house to pay for it all. Is that what these old people have worked all their lives for? And they're the lucky ones...they have insurance.

    It is a shame that Michael Moore is such a polarizing figure in America. Many people will dismiss this film simply because of who he is.
    Mary@MasterpieceTravels.com

  13. #12
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    The problem in my eye is that what he considers the better alternative. I've lived with the socialized health care - in Belgium and France both, and dealt with some major medical problems here in the US as well. I will take our health care system any day of the week - even having to fight the insurance companies. And those who know me know my saga in fighting them to cover my care.

    I'd much rather get the care I need when I need it and then fight the insurance company as opposed to not being able to get the care I need for months or years because a government body decided to ration it, or not offer it at all.

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  14. #13

    Tony,

    Although I completely respect your opinion, I think that only part of the issue is the maze of complications that insurance companies give us, I think that the bigger part is the many, many people who go without health care because they aren't insured. That's the part that distresses me the most. But the high cost is definitely a concern too...

    I don't think that there is any perfect system. But I think we have to fix the one we have right now.

    We're lucky to have insurance and can cover our kids. What worries me--and this is simply a personal thing--is what will happen when the oldest is too old to be covered by our insurance but is still in college (and I want him to go to school and focus on that rather than have to get a job that has benefits like health insurance). And anyone who knows that kid *knows* he needs good health insurance, considering what he puts his body through!

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