I just saw Michael Moore's new film, Capitalism: A Love Story. His most recent film explores a timely theme - America's relationship with American-style capitalism, and the chief architects of the system.
It wasn't my plan to watch it opening day - I'd actually forgotten about it, until I stumbled across Thursday's Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien interview with Michael Moore.
Capitalism: A Love Story is not an examination of who knew what, and when they knew it. Like his other films, it's more of an indictment of our elected leaders, our institutions, and our culture.
His style shows. In all his movies, there's some background, a lot of emotional moments with ordinary people caught in the maelstrom, humorous failed attempts to enter the halls of power, and even connections with Flint, Michigan, his hometown.
The opening is a masterful mix of a 1950s era documentary on the Roman Empire, cut with images from modern life. America as Rome has been a recurring leitmotif, especially among the scholars and jeremiads of domestic militarism. But I don't remember seeing such a concise and wry illustration of the similarities.
Even though Flint, GM, and his father's career at an auto parts plant come up, they are used as symptoms and clues, and not as a sustained metaphor for America's relationship with capitalism as both ideology and economic system in the postwar era.
As with Michael Moore's other films, his best footage is of ordinary Americans who are casualties in the battle between masters of the universe. One chapter, dealing with the existence and prevalence of insurance policies taken out on employees by an employer -- literally called "dead peasant" insurance in official correspondence by the banks -- is particularly chilling. The practice, while legal, is more insidious and creepy than the outrages documented by Moore in other movies.
I am grateful that the movie highlighted two things of which I was not previously aware:
1. Leaked Citigroup memos discussing America as a plutonomy and potential dangers from populist protest over a grossly inequitable wealth distribution
2. Floor speeches made by Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) screaming holy hell about the bailout bill.
Overall, the movie seemed to lack the energy that the other films had. He closes his film not with a stirring jeremiad, or a call to arms, but rather a somewhat resigned and tired plea for people to join him. "I can't keep doing this," he says, unless others somehow get involved.
Maybe it wasn't him. Maybe I'm the one who is exhausted, depressed, and numb to what has happened over the last year, or the last decade. I am a different person than I was in 2007. I'd like to get feedback from people who watch the movie on whether it felt noticeably different from Sicko and Fahrenheit 9/11.
Is it a must-watch? I'd have to say no, mostly because I'm not sure who would get something from the movie.
Those well versed in politics, economics and finance might find it breathtakingly and dangerously oversimplified. Similarly, someone completely ignorant of current events and the dismal science might embrace his message wholeheartedly, but be still left with a lack of agency and ultimately resignation that the issues are too big and, yes, inconceivable*, to do anything about it. And someone reasonably well-educated but not an expert on the issues might, with his or her friends, know just enough to have a long, fruitless, and confused argument about the movie afterwards.
Aside: We need to stop attributing vast mystery and power behind the word "derivative". I've included my somewhat simple, but hopefully clear, definition at the end of this.**
Perhaps it best serves not as a primer, but as a reminder that this last year was born from actions taking place over decades, by administrations from both parties, and by people who retain positions of great wealth and political power. We say, "Never forget," but we do. Films like this help us remember, even if we disagree on what precisely happened, or what to do about it.
Shameless plug: I'm still proud of my Dr. Seuss-like parody of the financial crisis, "TARP Funds in Hand".
Capitalism: A Love Story is rated R, and opened nationally on Friday.
*One of the interviewees is Wallace Shawn, most famous for his antics and frequent use of this word as Vizzini in The Princess Bride.
**Finally, for the record, a derivative's pricing may involve complicated mathematical models, but a derivative itself should not be too difficult a concept to grasp. As I understand it, it's a contract that derives its value from the value of whatever the contract is about. So, a contract to buy oil in September for $70 a barrel changes in value depending on how, and how much, the value of a barrel of oil changes (and as the time to expiration approaches).
Yes, the math can get damn complicated, but conceptually, people need to stop getting freaked out about them. Incidentally, the first futures contracts for agricultural goods were essentially used as insurance policies by farmers. So it might help to view derivatives as insurance contracts with so many terms and conditions that have morphed into speculative investment vehicles.
Finance-types: please feel free to point out the deficiencies in my definition and example
No comments:
Post a Comment