Where to Invade Next – Film Review by Frank L.

Director: Michael Moore
Stars: Michael Moore, Krista Kiuru, Tim Walker

Michael Moore appears to be mellowing in this latest documentary. He has decided to invade various countries whose names he can pronounce to discover various things that they do differently from the United States. He then like a sort of General Custer figure lays claim to the idea for the United States of America. He plants the Stars and Stripes physically in the room where he discovered how the different foreign system worked thereby acquiring it for the United States.

His first “conquest” is in Italy where he tries to come to terms with the number of days of holidays to which Italians are entitled. He is almost speechless as a thirty something year old Italian couple list their entitlement to holidays. This is a delightful sequence as Moore’s voice is genuinely incredulous as he comes to terms with what he is hearing. A similar sense of incredulity is in his voice as he interviews a murderer in jail. The jail, while certainly in a very remote place in Norway bears no resemblance to an American jail. In fact he drives in. He has a conversation with a murderer in the prison kitchen who has within easy access an array of knives attached to the wall by a magnet. In Slovenia he is dumbfounded as he tries to explain to two third level students, whose tuition is free, the concept of entering into debt in order to pay for their education. The most radical discovery is in Iceland where women have made the expression “gender equality” have practical consequences and where the women interviewed do not want men excluded. His bafflement at all these strange phenomena provokes a bewildered looking smile on his face as he compares it with what America does.

“Bowling for Columbine” and “Fahrenheit 9/11” were both hard hitting documentaries exposing the duplicitousness of certain American policies. In this documentary he is trying to educate his fellow Americans that certain other countries do things differently and better. Of course many countries, apart from USA, could benefit. Because he uses humour, it does not diminish the seriousness of the various messages he is hoping his viewers will take to their hearts. Perhaps his happiest moment in this gentle documentary was discovering an alphabet which had only 25 letters in it. When he enquired as to the missing letter his delight was dignified when the answer given was “W”.  It is a delicious moment.