October 11, 2002 | Let’s face it: We live in an age when real-life events frequently are far more fantastically absurd or epochally horrific than anything an author or filmmaker would dare contrive. At such a time, even the most inspired satirists are hard-pressed to invent anything more outrageous than yesterday’s headlines or last night’s newscast.
So it’s up to inquisitive observers like Michael Moore, the droll director-narrator of Roger & Me and the rabble-rousing author of Stupid White Men, to make us laugh -– and, perhaps more important, make us wince-– while we ponder imponderable questions, seek explanations for the inexplicable, and gradually come to accept that the world is even weirder, and the problems are more problematical, than we suspected.
Moore is up to his usual tricks in Bowling for Columbine, his latest free-form filmic essay, which means that, even when he’s taking shamelessly cheap shots, he’s more often than not on target. His sharp-eyed aim serves him well in a first-person documentary intended as nothing less ambitious than a contemplation of gun culture, violent crime and media-stoked paranoia in the United States.
The provocative title alludes to a darkly ironic historical footnote: A few hours before they gunned down a teacher and 12 classmates at Columbine High School in Littleton, Col., Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold played a few games at an on-campus bowling alley.
Moore doesn’t claim to see any connection between the innocent pastime and the subsequent killing spree. (And to make sure we know he appreciates the magnitude of the tragedy, he gives us a jolting peek at videotapes of Harris and Klebold during their rampage.) On the other hand, Moore does find it somehow relevant that the Columbine massacre occurred on April 20, 1999 — the heaviest day of U.S. bombing in Kosovo. And when he visits the nearby Lockheed Martin plant, 5,000 of whose employees live in the Littleton area, Moore none-too-subtly suggests another connection. Like, maybe when a father constructs nuclear missiles every day, his offspring may conclude it’s OK to shoot people.
Specious reasoning? Perhaps. But, then again, Moore doesn’t pretend to offer definitive answers, only pointed questions. Like, why does a Michigan bank offer guns to anyone opening a new account? (Moore shows up, deposit slip in hand, then ingenuously inquires: “Isn’t it dangerous to be giving away guns in a bank?”) Or, why do so many Americans feel violent crime has reached epidemic proportions when FBI statistics indicate a marked decline in murder rates? (Could it be due to “If it bleeds, it leads” TV news?) Why did the National Rifle Association refuse to cancel plans for a pro-gun rally in Colorado just weeks after the Columbine killings? (Near the end of the movie, NRA spokesman Charlton Heston walks away from a conversation with Moore when he realizes he’s being – pardon the pun — out-gunned.)
And by the way: Just why do so many Americans kill so many other Americans?
Moore, a lifetime NRA member himself, raises serious doubts that all the violence can be blamed on the widespread availability of guns in the United States. After all, he notes, Canadians have equally easy access to firearms, and they don’t shoot each other at nearly the same rate. But if it’s not guns – or video games, or violent TV shows, or even Marilyn Manson music – what’s the cause of our colossal body count?
Moore offers generous servings of food for thought throughout Bowling for Columbine. And while even people who share his views might dismiss some of what he serves as junk food – or, worse, skewed statistics — Moore provides an invaluable service by sparking debate and encouraging thought. Better still, he does all of this, and more, while remaining one of the most savagely hilarious social critics this side of Jonathan Swift.
