Posted 13th October, 2002

Michael Moore Bowls for Controversy

Critically-acclaimed doco Bowling for Columbine opens this weekend.

A tour de force from filmmaker Michael Moore, Bowling for Columbine is an alternately humorous and horrifying documentary about firearms abuse in the United States. The first documentary accepted into competition at Cannes since 1956, the film won a special 55th Anniversary Prize at the 2002 festival.

With his trademark charm and biting wit, Moore (director of Roger and Me and author of Amazon.com bestseller Stupid White Men) sets off on a rollicking journey to the heart of the country hoping to discover why the American pursuit of happiness is so riddled with violence. From a look at the Columbine High School security camera tapes to the home of Oscar®-winning NRA President Charlton Heston, from a young man who makes homemade napalm with The Anarchist's Cookbook to the murder of a six-year-old girl by another six-year-old, Bowling for Columbine is a powerful piece of filmmaking that will resonate with audiences dreading - but expecting - the next breaking news report about a homegrown assassin wielding a constitutionally-protected automatic weapon.

The film, which has already stirred up heated responses from some camps, treads an insightful path dotted with equal parts biting comedy and chilling terror as it turns the mirror upon a culture littered with violent obsessions.

Undoubtedly Moore's most ambitious documentary project yet, the film has won critical acclaim from sources as diverse as Rolling Stone's Peter Travers and the Chicago Sun Times' Roger Ebert, and has been successful in securing limited theatrical release in New York and Los Angeles starting October 11th, before moving to eight more cities next week.

With another controversial war on our doorsteps and news dominated by reports of a crazed sniper terrorizing Washington, it would be hard to imagine a more timely release date for this confronting piece.

View a trailer of this film in Windows Media Player format: 56K | 100K | 300K
The official promotional website of Bowling for Columbine may be found here.
 
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