SiCKO - Review
Just came back from watching SiCKO in the theatre. I know, I think I must be the last person on the planet to have watched this movie, but I have been locked away in Canada's arctic for the last 5 weeks so I have an excuse.
I thought this movie was great, but a few problems were still in my mind. Michael Moore has definitly started to refine his skills in the movie making industry. I could almost aquate him as a boxer. In his first fight he came out like a common street brawler, throwing punches and shots with anger and passion but having no finesse, no art, no real style. His second film, he learned from his mistakes and learned some style and art. With every fight he changed from a common street brawler to a heavy weight champion boxer. Learning to dance, rope-a-dope, avoiding hits and picking the spots where he can go in, throw a few punches, do the most damage and then dance out of reach.
The problem I had with the film though was that I found him slightly skewed when it came to comparison of the different countries and their health care. He seemed to have looked for the horror stories in the states but then went to the other countries and found the middle class. Granted he did interview an American that lost the tips of two of his fingers (and he could only afford to replace the $12,000 ring finger tip and not the $60,000 middle finger tip) and then a Canadian worker that lost basically 4 of his fingers on one hand and they all got surgically attached for free because of the Canadian health care system. Then when he was comparing the system as in looking at a family from America that was forced to move to their kids spare room because they couldnt afford the health costs because the husband had 3 heart attacks and the wife had been diagnosed with a tumour in her head. He then went to France and found a middle class family with the husband being an engineer and the wife being an assistant with two kids and they were living comfortably with an $8,000/month income and no debt. Granted, the point he might be making is that the health care puts people into debt, there should still be some common ground to compare.
Go to France/England/Canada and ask for the horror stories. I mean, I have heard some horrible stories about how Workers Compensation Board in Canada wont lift a finger to help people and if they can find a way to screw you over they would. I have heard that most people walk away from WCB thinking that they have been screwed over and no one has walked away happy. Though I would be the anomoly there since I was quite happy with the WCB, but thought that the health care system really needed a looking over. 4 months to get looked at, diagnosed and operated on is a little bit of wait, even for an elective surgery. But it was free (well free in that I didn't have a bill, but not free in that I pay for it through taxes), so can't really complain. I would be interested to see if the other countries had a few horror stories in that the doctors gave a wrong diagnosis, made a mistake here or there and permanantly screwed up someone's health to the point that they couldn't work but the gov't just shrugged their shoulders and went "oh well, what can you expect?"
Michael Moore definitly proved beyong a reasonable doubt that the American system is corrupt and does need reworking. However, as I was told when it comes to proving a point in an experiment or in an essay for university, don't try to prove that your thesis is right (the American health care system sucks) because you can always find evidence that you are right, but prove that your thesis is wrong (American health care system is perfect) because if you can prove that you are wrong, then obviously it is wrong, but if you can't find evidence that it is wrong, then you are obviously right. I found that he went out of his way to prove that the American Health Care system was bad, and he found that evidence, then he went out of his way to prove that the foreign socialized health care system was good, and he found that as well. If he had said that he put out a web page call for all horror stories in France/Britain and he got none whatsoever, then I would have more faith in the movie than if he had just contacted people that might have given him the right answers he was looking for.
Either which way, I found the movie incredibly informative, entertaining, wonderfully written and a great piece of cinema art. He is definitly using his 'power' for good and not evil and can not wait for his next piece to come out and see what he is going to turn his eyes towards.
I thought this movie was great, but a few problems were still in my mind. Michael Moore has definitly started to refine his skills in the movie making industry. I could almost aquate him as a boxer. In his first fight he came out like a common street brawler, throwing punches and shots with anger and passion but having no finesse, no art, no real style. His second film, he learned from his mistakes and learned some style and art. With every fight he changed from a common street brawler to a heavy weight champion boxer. Learning to dance, rope-a-dope, avoiding hits and picking the spots where he can go in, throw a few punches, do the most damage and then dance out of reach.
The problem I had with the film though was that I found him slightly skewed when it came to comparison of the different countries and their health care. He seemed to have looked for the horror stories in the states but then went to the other countries and found the middle class. Granted he did interview an American that lost the tips of two of his fingers (and he could only afford to replace the $12,000 ring finger tip and not the $60,000 middle finger tip) and then a Canadian worker that lost basically 4 of his fingers on one hand and they all got surgically attached for free because of the Canadian health care system. Then when he was comparing the system as in looking at a family from America that was forced to move to their kids spare room because they couldnt afford the health costs because the husband had 3 heart attacks and the wife had been diagnosed with a tumour in her head. He then went to France and found a middle class family with the husband being an engineer and the wife being an assistant with two kids and they were living comfortably with an $8,000/month income and no debt. Granted, the point he might be making is that the health care puts people into debt, there should still be some common ground to compare.
Go to France/England/Canada and ask for the horror stories. I mean, I have heard some horrible stories about how Workers Compensation Board in Canada wont lift a finger to help people and if they can find a way to screw you over they would. I have heard that most people walk away from WCB thinking that they have been screwed over and no one has walked away happy. Though I would be the anomoly there since I was quite happy with the WCB, but thought that the health care system really needed a looking over. 4 months to get looked at, diagnosed and operated on is a little bit of wait, even for an elective surgery. But it was free (well free in that I didn't have a bill, but not free in that I pay for it through taxes), so can't really complain. I would be interested to see if the other countries had a few horror stories in that the doctors gave a wrong diagnosis, made a mistake here or there and permanantly screwed up someone's health to the point that they couldn't work but the gov't just shrugged their shoulders and went "oh well, what can you expect?"
Michael Moore definitly proved beyong a reasonable doubt that the American system is corrupt and does need reworking. However, as I was told when it comes to proving a point in an experiment or in an essay for university, don't try to prove that your thesis is right (the American health care system sucks) because you can always find evidence that you are right, but prove that your thesis is wrong (American health care system is perfect) because if you can prove that you are wrong, then obviously it is wrong, but if you can't find evidence that it is wrong, then you are obviously right. I found that he went out of his way to prove that the American Health Care system was bad, and he found that evidence, then he went out of his way to prove that the foreign socialized health care system was good, and he found that as well. If he had said that he put out a web page call for all horror stories in France/Britain and he got none whatsoever, then I would have more faith in the movie than if he had just contacted people that might have given him the right answers he was looking for.
Either which way, I found the movie incredibly informative, entertaining, wonderfully written and a great piece of cinema art. He is definitly using his 'power' for good and not evil and can not wait for his next piece to come out and see what he is going to turn his eyes towards.
posted by Capt_Canuck at 9:58 PM
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