This is a review?
Categories: Randomness|He says he was inspired by the impending birth of his first child to find bin Laden and hoped to make the world a safer place. Yet he leaves his wife, Alexandra, at home to worry about him as he repeatedly puts himself in harm’s way over several months.
Fiilm Clips: New Spurlock film riskier than burgers
I have a mild curiousity, at best, about Morgan Spurlock’s latest flim, “Where in the World Is Osama bin Laden?” I followed the above link in my local paper thinking I would actually get a review of the film. Instead, all I got was a public berating of Spurlock for leaving his poor pregnant wife at home.
Researching this post, I found that what the Post-Gazette ran was a shortened version of the original review. “Ah”, I thought. Perhaps it was just poor editing that made it sound as if the writer had dashed it out after arguing with her hubby over a night out with the boys. It turned out to be more of the same:
(Spurlock admits in the film’s production notes that his wife objected to him taking this trip with a baby coming — and who could blame her? — but he went anyway, in the name of entertainment.)
And:
Meanwhile, his wife is back in Manhattan by herself (except for the camera crew, of course) having early contractions and telling him about them on the cell phone.”Here I am, missing it all,” Spurlock laments once he hangs up. Certainly, he had a choice in the matter.
And the only moment she notes as “substantive” is a conversation with an Moroccan man about parenting. No acknowledgment of the 4000 American lives lost - sons, daughters, husbands or wives. Since there is no draft, all of these people are there as a “volunteer” force. (Of course, if there were ever to be a draft and some of the privileged class had to go to the Middle East, this war would come to a screeching halt.) And she makes a fairly glib dismissal of one of the movie’s main points, that the Iraqis are flesh and blood people - just like us.
Yes, Spurlock delivers his message couched in humor. How else is he supposed to reach a public that makes “American Idol” a number one rated show? How else do you reach a public that has become numb or even complacent to war coverage? (Well, besides trumpeting a terror alert whenever poll numbers are slipping, that is.)
Besides - someone has to look for bin Laden. Bush sure as hell doesn’t care anymore.
Tags: spurlock, bush, iraq, Lemire
