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After traveling for an hour to sit in a crowded room of angry and crying people, I had a big fight with my partner right on the middle of the street. We were not assaulting each other for any of those men are from this planet, women are from some other planet reasons. Feeling dejected and bitter, we could not contain our emotions because we had just heard the stories of people who had been abandoned by our own United States to die slowly, painfully, and without dignity. Am I being too cryptic? Let me clarify: we had just heard Michael Moore tell it like it really is in SiCKO and damn it, the truth hurts.
I don’t want to spoil the film or lessen the documentary’s full emotive effect for those who have plans to see SiCKO after its June 29th release date next Friday, but I will say that as always, Moore combined his sensitivity, patriotism, insight, delving analysis, and just the right touch of sarcasm to tell the stories of those who have otherwise not been heard despite their all-too-painfully-familiar paradigms.
Moore’s most recent film is not just an inoculative needle prick about the ills of the American health-care system, it is a far more invasive undertaking that delicately picks apart all of the wrongs and injustices predicated by the inherent greed and capitalistic lust that underlies social policy in the United States. Using average American citizens as his surgical tools, he dissects the systematic political artifice to find insurance companies that rob the sick and dying, politicians that cheat the elderly, a lack of social concern for future generations, blatant imperialism, murder, and disrespect for those who have sacrificed when the United States government failed to care for other people.
Most notably, Moore does not only travel around the United States for his documentary. He also travels to England, France, Canada, and Cuba. What he found in those places were people who felt profoundly sorry for Americans, people who asked how a country as powerful as the United States could abandon its most vulnerable citizens at their time of need. The highlight of the film is undoubtedly Moore’s surprise trip to Cuba with three boat-loads of sick people in need of treatment. Moore does an excellent job of destroying the myths and stereotypes that are often perpetrated by the American media about these countries and the people who live there.
Unfortunately, SiCKO does not offer any solutions to the problems posed in the film. But, what it does do is make you feel angry and confrontational enough to go out and demand some answers and solutions from the powers-that-be.
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Glad you enjoyed the movie, Mialka! I also went out and saw the sneak peek on Saturday. I used to consult for both drug companies and health insurance companies, and unfortunately, Moore did a pretty good job of outlining how the incentives for private health insurance companies are often lined up against patient care.
I think he glossed over the Medicare Modernization Act, though, which was an important instance of federal funds used to cover more patients. I also think he rather oversimplified the single-payer systems he highlighted.
At the risk of self-promotion, I wrote a very full review of SiCKO on my own blog, in which I tried to scratch below the surface of what's presented. I hope you find that useful in understanding some of the underlying issues.
It would be nice if Michael Moore told the truth every now and then. Cuba has better health care than the USA??? Who does he think he is kidding??? Take a look at the many folks that review Michael Moore, like G Beck, on YouTube to get a better understanding of how far wrong Michael Moore is on just about everything. Cuba better at health care -- Michael, you are trying to put one over on a lot of gulable people!!!
Why is it my best friends in England have to come to the U.S.A. to get mammograms? Their family history is full of breast cancer but the public health system won't let them get checked until age 50.
Get real Mr. Moore starts with his point of view and then takes film to support it. This is NOT a documentary it is an opinion piece.
All documentaries take a point of view, lets be real here.
And altough I am sure that the case was stretched a bit - the fact is that US does not come up to snuff in care - look at the lawsuits against Blue Shield in California by doctors and the gov - most healthcare insurance is expensive and fairly useless if you get sick and try to use those benes.
G Beck as a reference for the truth about Cuban healthcare??? I saw this same rant on TV, and when he surmised that Cuba's last contribution to medicine was the leach, I'd had enough. The man is an ignoramus if he actually believes his own stuff. You don't have to read some leftist broadsheet to come to my conclusion re. Beck's expertise on Cuban healthcare. You can go to Science, a mixed popular/professional journal of no discernable political bias to read about the Cuban biotechnology industry. Cuban medical researchers specialize in diseases of 3rd world countries that our pharmaceutical companies won't touch (not profitable enough). You can find the same info from other US sources. Same thing re. Cuban healthcare teams in other poor countries. There are specialties in Cuban medicine that draw patients from other Latin American countries. To be fair, Cuban medicine had a good reputation in the Batista era too. Yet, despite the flight of Cuban doctors and the loss of its Soviet sponshorip during an ongoing embargo, the Castro regime has somehow preserved that system. I will not be an apologist for their authoritaritarian dictatorship (neither was Moore, by the way). I hope that someday Cuba will become a social democracy that preserves their real accomplishments in education, public health, and medical research. Moore was one visitor who has told the truth about this aspect of Cuba. Maybe that's what Beck and the anti-Cuban pro-boycott crowd are afraid of - the truth.