Sicko

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Post by criddic3 »

[Allow me to introduce Criddic to you.]


As someone who gave a favorable rating to Bowling for Columbine, despite its obvious flaws and Moore's tendency to make himself out a hero, I'll give Sicko a chance. However, his tactics still turn me off and his decision to use Cuba as counterpoint to U.S. medical system is worrisome to me.
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"Filmmaker Michael Moore's brilliant and uplifting new documentary, 'Sicko,' deals with the failings of the U.S. healthcare system, both real and perceived. But this time around, the controversial documentarian seems to be letting the subject matter do the talking, and in the process shows a new maturity."

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Sicko
Lee Marshall in Cannes
19 May 2007 14:55
Screendaily

Dir: Michael Moore. US. 2007. 123 mins.


If it works, don't fix it. Michael Moore's passionate, bullying, gag-laced approach to the "j'accuse" documentary worked a treat in Bowling for Columbine and Farenheit 9/11 - and it works even better in Sicko, his investigation of the US public healthcare system. Moore doesn't change his methods - he still plays to the gallery, and fingered corporate or government culprits are still given little or no right to reply.

This time round, Moore simply chooses an easier target - an injustice that anyone who believes in human solidarity, whatever their political affiliation, is going to have to work hard to disagree with. [Allow me to introduce Criddic to you.] Unlike gun control or US involvement in Iraq, the country's insurance-based healthcare model is an issue that daily affects every single American, and the consensus that something is wrong with a system that lets people die if they're not properly covered (Moore documents a number of such cases) breaks down a little less along political lines, at least outside of Capitol Hill and state legislatures.

Whether this will mean that Sicko will reach out beyond the Moore faithful on home territory is still debatable; his unsubtle methods will still attract accusations of bias from the anti-Moore camp (of which more later). But Moore knows how to generate publicity, and the film's final coup - taking a group of 9/11 volunteer rescue workers first to Guantanamo Bay, then to Cuba, in search of the medical treatment they have been denied back home - will create a huge media buzz (which has already been set humming by news that the US Treasury Department is investigating Moore for breaking the US trade embargo with Cuba).

Abroad, especially in Europe, Sicko will shock and comfort in equal measure - if we were being uncharitable, we might view his decision to contrast the US system with the free health care offered in Canada, Britain and especially France as a feel-good gift to audiences and distributors in those territories. But the points Moore makes here are (mostly) well-founded - and managed, as always, with a vein of irony that makes it difficult to dissent.

We all know that behind his lumbering persona and his Lieutenant Colombo play-dumb questioning style, Moore is one smart cookie: and the smart move he makes in Sicko, stated at the outset, is not to focus on the problems of the 45 million Americans who can't afford to pay for health insurance, but to examine the way the system has failed the 250 million who do pay for cover.

Edited for maximum effect by, among others, Dan Swietlik (An Inconvenient Truth), Sicko mixes voice-over factoids with walk-and-talk interviews. We meet a man who had to choose which of two fingers should be sown back on after an accident, because he couldn't afford to pay for both; and a woman who received a bill from her insurance company following a car crash because the ambulance ride had not been pre-approved.

Gradually the main players are sketched in - the big insurance companies like Horizon Blue Cross or Kaiser Permanente, whose practices are revealed via interviews with whistle-blowing former employees or associates, including a medical reviewer who, she says, was employed to save the companies money by turning down applications - thus, effectively, killing people.

Jaunty or mock-heroic music (including, at one stage, the Star Wars theme) and comic insets of archive footage (like the marching troops and smiling Soviet peasants who are used to illustrate an ironic voice-over point about the dangers of "Socialised Medicine") keep the mood from getting too bleak or strident.

After a sideswipe at Hilary Clinton (accused of burying her healthcare-for-all campaign after receiving campaign contributions from the health industry lobby), Moore is on the road - in Canada, Britain and France, whose welfare states are contrasted with the American private system. Moore interviews a British doctor who drives an Audi and lives in a million-dollar house, while in Paris (cue Moore lumbering along a boulevard to the strains of "Je t'aime") he has dinner with a group of US ex-pats who gush (sincerely, it should be said) about France's state-subsidised health and childcare facilities.

Of course, Moore paints a rosy picture: one example of his editorial sleight of hand is the way he moves straight from praising the British NHS (National Health System) to criticising the way US university students are saddled with debt - without mentioning that their British counterparts have long had exactly the same student-loan millstone around their necks.

Then comes the Cuban punch: taking a group of ailing 9/11 volunteers across to Guantanamo Bay ("the one place on American soil that has free universal health care") and then to Havana to get proper treatment. Much like the Walmart scene that wraps Columbine, it will inevitably attract accusations of manipulation. And of course, it is manipulative: Moore needs this pay-off, just as he needs the upper-cut revelation that he sent an anonymous cheque to Jim Kenefick, the man who runs Moorewatch – the main anti-Moore website - so that he could pay his wife's medical bills and keep the site open. (It's easy to sympathise with Kenefick's reaction to the stunt, posted on his website: "He paid $12,000 so he could manufacture a "gotcha" moment in his film. Sounds pretty cheap to me.")

But this is what distinguishes a Moore film from a balanced, nuanced documentary like The Fog of War. It may not be subtle, but it makes for great, heart-on-sleeve cinema.
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Post by Sonic Youth »

Sicko

By Kirk Honeycutt
May 20, 2007
Hollywood Reporter



CANNES -- This is the movie where Michael Moore gets a few Michael Moore haters off his back. "Sicko" posits an uncontroversial, if not incontrovertible, proposition: The health care system in the U.S. is sick. Even a right-wing Republican, when denied care by his HMO or stuck with an astronomical bill, is going to agree. Disagreement may come over the prescription Dr. Moore suggests. But he makes so much damn sense in his arguments that the discussion could be civilized except for the heat coming from the health care industry, with billions of dollars in profits at stake, and certain politicians whose pockets are lined with industry campaign donations.

Not that "Sicko," which screened Out of Competition, avoids Moore's usual oversimplification and cute stunts. But the gist of his arguments is sound, and only a wealthy HMO executive would claim no problems exists in American medical care. "Sicko" will undoubtedly follow his previous docus in attracting wide viewership from audiences normally not attuned to the documentary experience so boxoffice should be considerable in North America. While the discussion is, as always with Moore, a uniquely American one, audiences in Europe and other markets will want to eavesdrop for the sheer fun of seeing Americans wallow in problems they solved years ago. The movie begins with horror stories. So much so that Moore is not always able to lighten things up with his usual brand of comedy. But he does manage some sick humor as he recounts not only the travails of the 47 million uninsured Americans, but of those who think they have health insurance, paid for with years of premiums, only to be denied a medical procedure they desperately need.

He traces this tragic situation back to an Oval Office deal cooked up by President Nixon -- caught on the infamous White House tapes -- to foist managed health care on the unsuspecting public. Nixon loves it because it's not some do-good government program. "It's for profit," he enthuses.

Indeed it is. The tales unravel about how a successful medical claim is called a "medical loss" by the insurance industry and how denying claims can lead to promotions in that industry. The film details how the health industry spent more than $100 million to defeat President Clinton's universal health care package and currently maintains four D.C. lobbyists for every member of Congress.

Most of the rhetoric against having universal health care focuses on the words "socialized medicine." The question Moore has is this: While a policeman coming to your rescue or a fireman answering an alarm does not ask for payment and therefore represents government assistance, why do Americans place their crucial health care needs in the hands of for-profit insurance companies?

Those countries that have tried "socialized medicine" have seen patients suffer long waits and bureaucratic interference in doctors' decisions, according to politicians opposed to universal health care. "Just ask a Canadian!" thunders the previous President Bush, referring to that county's health system.

Moore takes up the challenge, going not only to Canada but to Britain and France to ask. In Canada he encounters a man who caught a hockey puck the wrong way and sliced off all the fingers on his hand. "Socialized medicine" put the fingers back. By contrast, an American who sliced off only two fingertips was told one tip would cost $60,000 to repair but the other only $12,000. He chose the $12,000 operation.

In a London hospital, Moore milks the no-cost system for all the humor it's worth as he desperately searches the facility for any sign of a billing department. He finds none. Finally, he spots a cashier sign. But he is dumbfounded to learn this is where people who paid for transit to the hospital can get reimbursed for that cost.

In France, the search for pre-existing conditions has dramatically different implications than in the U.S.: Whereas American insurance companies scrutinize enrollment forms for signs of a pre-existing condition that wasn't disclosed so as to deny a claim, in France it is to determine potentially better or even preventative treatment.

Why do even conservative citizens of these countries want universal health care? How did this all come about? "It all begins with democracy," says a former British MP. In Britain, where the National Health Service was founded in 1948, any attempt to dismantle the system would spark genuine revolution, he says.

The MP's opinion that some in the U.S. government want citizens to have poor health and education so they remain "scared and demoralized" and unwilling to vote may strike some as extreme. But when Moore turns his camera back on the U.S., where private hospitals in Los Angeles have taken to dumping destitute patients at homeless shelters on skid row, it is clear that this industry needs regulation.

Moore's final trip abroad is the one that made headlines recently with the news that the U.S. Treasury Department is investigating him for possible violations of the U.S. trade embargo restricting travel to Cuba. Yes, Moore did take several of the sick people he visited earlier in the film to Cuba, including rescue workers suffering from the effects of working at Ground Zero yet denied necessary care by the government. And in the poverty stricken land of Fidel, they get state-of-the-art diagnostic services, treatment programs and, in one case, a five-cent drug that would cost $120 in the States.

Sure, this is a stunt and fails to deal with the chronic unemployment and economic malaise of that communist state. But if you can get that quality of health care in Cuba, why not in Nebraska? It all begins with democracy.
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Post by Sonic Youth »

From various Cannes bloggers, as reported on Greencine.com:


Michael Moore's Sicko is screening Out of Competition at Cannes - and at the ungodly hour of 8:30 am, too. "I felt the film works completely as entertainiment, and as usual, Moore makes a hard-hitting and topical argument by using comedic elements," blogs Matt Dentler, who lists "quick stand-out moments from today's screening and highlights from the film," among them: "Hillary Clinton is actually called out, for unsuccessfully fighting the healthcare biz while her husband was president, and then later taking major contributions from them once she was a New York Senator."

"Sicko didn't tell me anything radically new about what an absurd health-care system we have, but it spelled out very clearly and, it seemed to me, honestly how much better the health-care systems are in Canada, England and France," writes Jeffrey Wells. "It's not just an eye-opener, in short, but a movie that opens your emotional pores."

"As someone who loved Bowling for Columbine, but found Fahrenheit 911 to be self-indulgent and unsurprising, I went to the movie with few expectations," admits Jared Moshe. "Surprise, surprise I loved the movie."

"Lost in all the publicity over Moore's trip is the reason he went to Cuba in the first place," reports the AP's Jocelyn Noveck, who talks with Moore and some of the 9/11 "first responders" he took there. "He says he hadn't intended to go, but then discovered the U.S. government was boasting of the excellent medical care it provides terror suspects detained at Guantanamo. So Moore decided that the 9/11 workers and a few other patients, all of whom had serious trouble paying for care at home, should have the same chance."


http://blogs.indiewire.com/mattdentler/archives/013582.html

http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/archives/2007/05/sicko_has_been.php

http://blogs.indiewire.com/jaredmoshe/archives/013583.html

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070519/ap_en_mo/michael_moore_cuba
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Post by Sonic Youth »

First review...

Sicko

By ALISSA SIMON
Variety




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.

Pic should also play well internationally, providing an eye-opening lesson for foreigners who may be inclined (like Moore's Canadian cousins) to take out insurance from their homeland before visiting the States.

Employing his trademark personal narration and David vs. Goliath approach, Moore enlivens what is, in essence, a depressing subject by wrapping it in irony and injecting levity wherever possible: a long list of health conditions that spark a reason for a person to be denied insurance coverage sail into deep space accompanied by the "Stars Wars" theme; a graph showing America's position in global health care as No. 38 -- just above Slovenia -- is followed by film footage of primitive operating conditions.

Pic explores why American health care came to be exploited for profit in the private sector rather than being a government paid, free-to-consumers service such as education, libraries, fire and police. Moore comes up with an archival audio recording of Richard Nixon from February 1971, praising Edgar Kaiser and his system using incentives for less medical care. The next day Nixon addresses the nation, proposing a new health care strategy that amounted to a less-per-patient expenditure to maximize profit.

Pic starts by sketching a gamut of health care horror stories from average Americans: those who can't afford insurance, those who are denied coverage for various, often ludicrous reasons, and those who believe themselves well-protected, but find that the moment they avail themselves of medical services their insurance provider uses obscure technical reasons to refuse coverage, retroactively deny claims and cancel insurance, or raise rates so astronomically that the patient is forced into the ranks of the nearly 50 million uninsured.

Perhaps most emotionally affecting story comes from Julie, a hospital worker whose husband had a potentially terminal illness that medical staff thought could be treated with a bone marrow transplant. Insurance deemed the treatment experimental and refused to cover it. Unable to afford an alternative, the husband died.

The congressional testimony of a former Humana medical director provides a devastatingly direct description of what she calls "the dirty work of managed care." Constantly told that she was not denying care to patients, rather simply denying them Humana's coverage, her career advanced as she saved her corporation money.

Moore appears in his shambling folksy persona about 40 minutes into the pic [40 minutes?! Has he developed a sense of modesty?], interviewing foreign citizens, American expatriates, hospital workers and doctors in countries with nationalized health care such as Canada, England and France. The dramatic contrast with America is played for laughs, as the seemingly incredulous Moore continually mutters, "What do you mean it's free?"

Pic's most dramatic (and now controversial) tactic involves Moore taking a group that includes 9/11 rescue volunteers with medical problems that haven't been covered by insurance to Cuba -- first to Guantanamo Bay, which Moore proclaims as the only place on American soil with universal health care, and then to a Havana hospital where they are given treatment. Cuban seg wraps with a poignant expression of emotional solidarity between 9/11 volunteers and Cuban firemen who pay them homage.

Pic incorporates extensive archival footage (some of which comes across as grainy on the bigscreen) as well as home movies and photographs. Extracts from Communist musicals, classic comedies and horror films provide Moore further opportunity for comic editorializing.
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Producer: US government trying to seize new Michael Moore film


Harvey Weinstein fires latest shot in battle over healthcare documentary

Charlotte Higgins in Cannes
Saturday May 19, 2007
The Guardian


Cannes is smacking its lips in anticipation of filmmaker and provocateur Michael Moore's latest jeremiad against the US administration, which receives its premiere at the film festival today. Sicko, a documentary tackling the state of American healthcare, focuses on the pharmaceutical giants, and particularly on health insurers.

The film has already caused Moore - who won the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2004 with Fahrenheit 911 - to clash with the American authorities. Now, according to movie mogul Harvey Weinstein, whose Weinstein Company is behind the film, the US government is attempting to impound the negative.

According to Weinstein, the US Treasury's moves meant "we had to fly the movie to another country"- he would not say to where. "Let the secret service find that out - though this is the same country that thought there were weapons of mass destruction, so they'll never find it." He added that he feared that if the film were impounded, there might be attempts to cut some footage, in particular the last 20 minutes, which related to a trip to Cuba. This, said Weinstein, "would not be good."

In March, Moore travelled to the Caribbean island with a group of emergency workers from New York's Ground Zero to see whether they would receive better care under the Castro regime than they had under George Bush. He had applied for permission to travel in October 2006 and received no reply.

In a letter dated May 2, the treasury department notified Moore that it was investigating him for unlicensed travel to Cuba, or, as the missive put it, engaging in "travel-related transactions involving Cuba."

Now team Moore is hitting back. Weinstein has hired an attorney, David Boies, who has lodged a request under the US freedom of information act to find out what motivated the treasury to begin its investigation. "They have to tell us why they did it and what they did," said Weinstein. "And they are not too happy about it."

Weinstein believes the investigation has a political agenda. "We want to find out who motivated this. We suspect there may be interference from another office," he said. "Otherwise, I don't understand why this would have come about."

Weinstein named no suspects in this putative political interference, but referred to outspoken critics of Moore on the Republican right - who tend to accuse him of peddling propaganda rather than of undertaking serious journalism - including presidential hopeful Bob Thompson.

"Senator Thompson has come out with a tirade against Michael. Michael said he'd debate him, but Thompson turned him down," said Weinstein.

He also said that insurers and pharmaceutical companies had "already sent out letters advising employees how to react when the film comes out".

Weinstein appeared to be enjoying the brouhaha that the film is stirring up before it has even screened. "I've already told the Treasury that they are saving me money on advertising."

In Cannes, the Weinstein Company's offices are decorated with a mural of the rotund Moore sitting in a hospital waiting area flanked by a pair of skeletons, and Sicko sticking plasters are being given away as promotional gifts.

Moore's underlying thesis in Sicko relates to the structure of American society. "Others see themselves as a collective that sinks or swims together," he told Variety.

"It's important to have a safety net and free universal health care. In America, unfortunately, we're more focused on what's in it for me. It's every man for himself. If you're sick and have lost a job, it's not my problem. Don't bother me."

The insurance companies are a negative force, he believes. "They get in the way of taking care of those who are ill. They make it worse. We don't need them," he said.

The health secretary, Patricia Hewitt, may be surprised by Moore's ringing - if strictly speaking, factually inaccurate - endorsement for the NHS. "The poorest Brit is healthier and lives longer than the wealthiest American," he said.

Of his journalistic style, he said: "It's the op-ed page. You don't say that's not journalism. I present my opinion, my take on things, based on indisputable facts. They could be wrong. I think they're right." Moore's biggest hit to date has been Fahrenheit 911, which took $222m (£112m) worldwide. He made Bowling For Columbine, his acclaimed film about US gun culture, in 2002. The rightwing backlash has spawned a number of documentaries questioning his methods, including Rick Caine and Debbie Melnyk's Manufacturing Dissent. Moore has hired Al Gore's former press secretary, Chris Lehane, to help him to deal with "the forces I'm up against".
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Post by Damien »

criddic3 wrote:
"I understand why the Bush administration is coming after me - I have tried to help the very people they refuse to help, but until George W. Bush outlaws helping your fellow man, I have broken no laws and I have nothing to hide."


Hahaha. If that isn't THE most over-the-top performance of the year, I don't know what is. Give the man a Razzie already!
ANd you'll be in the last row of the balcony wanking over the footage of Worst President Ever.
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"I understand why the Bush administration is coming after me - I have tried to help the very people they refuse to help, but until George W. Bush outlaws helping your fellow man, I have broken no laws and I have nothing to hide."


Hahaha. If that isn't THE most over-the-top performance of the year, I don't know what is. Give the man a Razzie already!
"Because here’s the thing about life: There’s no accounting for what fate will deal you. Some days when you need a hand. There are other days when we’re called to lend a hand." -- President Joe Biden, 01/20/2021
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Whether Michael Moore's newest film will be good, or as successful as Fahrenheit 9/11, remains to be seen. But it's gonna get lots of press. Ready? Here we go...


Moore Blasts Bush Over Film-Trip Probe

May 11, 6:43 PM (ET)
By DAVID GERMAIN




LOS ANGELES (AP) - Filmmaker Michael Moore has asked the Bush administration to call off an investigation of his trip to Cuba to get treatment for ailing Sept. 11 rescue workers for a segment in his upcoming health-care expose, "Sicko."

Moore, who made the hit documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" assailing President Bush's handling of Sept. 11, said in a letter to U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on Friday that the White House may have opened the investigation for political reasons.

"For five and a half years, the Bush administration has ignored and neglected the heroes of the 9/11 community," Moore said in the letter, which he posted on the liberal Web site Daily Kos. "These heroic first responders have been left to fend for themselves, without coverage and without care.

"I understand why the Bush administration is coming after me - I have tried to help the very people they refuse to help, but until George W. Bush outlaws helping your fellow man, I have broken no laws and I have nothing to hide."

Harvey Weinstein, whose Weinstein Co. is releasing "Sicko," told The Associated Press the movie is a "healing film" that could bring opponents together over the ills of America's health-care system.

"This time, we didn't want the fight, because the movie unites both sides," Weinstein said. "We've shown the movie to Republicans. Both sides of the bench love the film. The pharmaceutical industry won't like the movie. HMOs will try to run us out of town, but that's not relevant to the situation.

"The whole campaign this time was not to be incendiary. It was, can Michael Moore bring both sides together?"

The health-care industry Moore skewers in "Sicko" was a major contributor to Bush's 2004 re-election campaign and to Republican candidates over the last four years, Moore wrote.

"I can understand why that industry's main recipient of its contributions - President Bush - would want to harass, intimidate and potentially prevent this film from having its widest possible audience," Moore wrote.

Treasury officials in Washington said Friday they would have no comment on the contents of Moore's letter, citing a policy against discussing specific investigations being conducted by Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, the agency that enforces the trade embargo against Cuba.

"Generally speaking, as administrators and enforcers of U.S. sanctions, OFAC is required to investigate potential violations of these programs," Treasury spokeswoman AnnMarie Hauser said. "In doing so, OFAC issues hundreds of letters each year asking for additional information when possible sanctions violations have occurred."

OFAC notified Moore in a letter dated May 2 that it was conducting a civil investigation for possible violations of the U.S. trade embargo restricting travel to Cuba.

Moore questioned the timing of the investigation, noting that "Sicko" premieres May 19 at the Cannes Film Festival and debuts in U.S. theaters June 29. The Bush administration knew of his plans to travel to Cuba since last October, said Moore, who went there in March with about 10 ailing workers involved in the rescue effort at the World Trade Center ruins.

Weinstein said the investigation would only help publicize the film.

"The timing is amazing. You would think that we originated this. It reads like a fiction best-seller," Weinstein said.

The Weinstein Co. said it has hired David Boies, the chief attorney in Al Gore's recount battle against Bush in the 2000 presidential election, to help on the "Sicko" case.

Cuba on Friday characterized Moore as a victim of censorship and the U.S. trade embargo.

The Communist Party daily Granma called the 45-year-old U.S. travel and trade sanctions "a criminal action that has cost lives and grave consequences for the inhabitants of the island," as well as Americans.

"Any resemblance to McCarthyism is no coincidence," the newspaper opined, referring to the political witch hunt that U.S. Sen. Joseph McCarthy carried out against suspected American communists in the 1950s.

The U.S. government's targeting of Moore "confirms the imperial philosophy of censorship" by American officials, it added.

U.S. State Department officials on Friday declined to comment on Granma's criticisms of the American government and referred calls to the Treasury Department.

OFAC's letter to Moore noted that he had applied in October 2006 for permission as a full-time journalist to travel to Cuba, but that the agency had not made any determination on his request.

The agency gave Moore 20 business days to provide details on his Cuba trip and the names of those who accompanied him.

Moore won an Academy Award for best documentary with his 2002 gun-control film "Bowling for Columbine" and scolded Bush in his Oscar acceptance speech as the war in Iraq was just getting under way.

The investigation has given master promoter Moore another jolt of publicity just before the release of one of his films. "Fahrenheit 9/11" premiered at Cannes in 2004 amid a public quarrel between Moore and the Walt Disney Co., which refused to let subsidiary Miramax release the film because of its political content.

Miramax bosses Harvey and Bob Weinstein ended up releasing the film on their own and later left to form the Weinstein Co., distributor of "Sicko."

"This is 'Fahrenheit' all over again. 'Let's pressure somebody.' Last time it was Disney, this time it's direct," Harvey Weinstein said.

"Fahrenheit 9/11" won the top prize at Cannes and went on to become the top-grossing documentary ever with $119 million.
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