Bowling for Columbine

Bowling for columbine
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I’m here to talk about Michael Moore’s film ‘Bowling for Columbine’ and some of the techniques that are used in the film. Michael Moore uses persuasive film techniques to position the audience to accept his version of the truth. Some of the techniques used by Michael Moore to position the audience are editing, sequencing and music. He uses them by editing parts of the film to marginalize the NRA and gun owners. He sequences the film into a certain position to make the movie more effective and uses music to position the audience to feel a certain way.
In Michael Moore’s documentary, Bowling for Columbine, Moore uses the rhetorical technique of juxtaposition. By carefully placing specific clips either next to each other, or after one another, Moore is able to bring a clear argument to the viewer. The first example is when we see the NRA rally held just after the Columbine shootings. Charlton Heston is giving his persuasive and motivating speech, yelling the words, “from my cold dead hands,” while holding a rifle of course. Then the film quickly cuts to a scene of a Columbine victim’s father speaking out about his son and why he is protesting the NRA rally that Charlton Heston is in fact leading. Soon after, we cut back to the rally once again, with Heston still gripping that rifle and aggressively yelling. This back-and-forth between the two opposing views allows the viewer to see both sides of the situation. We see this same juxtaposition between Charlton Heston’s second rally, in Flint, Michigan, and the principal of the elementary school where the little girl got shot. Similar situation, similar idea put into the minds of the audience. This brings us to the fairness and legitimacy of this technique. Is it necessarily fair to put an incredibly sad and grieving person up against Charlton Heston, a pompous gun-wielding celebrity? However, Moore’s strategic placement of the two clips – one with a person mourning a loss and the other with a man who is pro-guns is not necessarily fair to those who support the NRA. The clips are set up to go back-and-forth so viewers can see Heston as somewhat of a monster, and see how insensitive he is while the poor victims’ families are suffering. Certainly, the families are suffering, but this juxtaposition makes Heston and the NRA someone to blame for the tragedy, simply because the clips are placed next to each other.

Bowling for columbine is a documentary that was made in 2002 detailing the events surrounding the Massacre that took place on April 20 1999. In Bowling for Columbine, Michael Moore deals with the issues of gun and gun crime in USA. One of the purposes of this film is to persuade American’s to change their ideas about guns and gun laws, Moore shows this in his film by showing small clips and photos of people using guns in a inappropriate manner. Michael Moore constantly refers to other countries such as Canada and their gun policies to back up his arguments for increase gun regulation. He is successfully able to counter argue any reason given by pro gun supporters as to the reason why America has the highest gun related crimes and deaths, even though other countries have similar attitudes toward violence. The scenes selected for Bowling for Columbine display Moore’s ability to successfully persuade the audience to accept his point of view. Bowling for Columbine is an attempt to define the social issues that have created America's gun crazed, fear mongering, violent society. The movies centerpiece is the killing spree at Columbine High School, committed by Erik Harris and Dylan Klebold supposedly after they had attended their morning bowling class. Moore is the perfect gadfly, his polite almost humorous questions provoke revealing reactions from interviewees. His goal is not to provide answers or solutions for the issues he raises, but rather expose misconceptions and make the audience ask questions. The film wasn’t really not about the Columbine massacre. That was just a way to introduce the subject of violence. That said, the film was not exactly about violence either because at the base of this documentary was the impression that America is just not fair. Michael Moore makes the point by taking the argument to Canada. Why is it that Canada has guns but the crime rate is lower? The obvious answer that the audience simply has to summarise is that America is class based. Behaviors and events depicted in the film Bowling for Columbine are carefully crafted to portray this point of view. It is not meant to take a fair look at the subject. Many of Moore’s tactics are questionable, but his logic is mesmerizing. While one can point to flaws in his ideas, it is hard to completely oppose his points. He makes extremely interesting connections between events. the message is hardly about guns, but about social issues. The gun control issue is one of the most debated in the United States. The US is one of few countries that allow its citizens the right to have firearms. Due to this, there are many more gun related fatalities compared to other countries that do not allow their citizens to keep firearms. Bowling for Columbine focuses mostly on one tragic event that happened at Columbine High School, and uses it in order to persuade viewers to side against National Rifle Association, which is a big pro-gun group, and the whole gun control issue. Moore makes the reason why the US has more gun related fatalities than other countries to be because of the right to carry firearms and easy access to them. In the movie, Moore uses a lot of editing and splices together a lot of scenes in order to get his points across. In fact, he does this so much that the whole film is misleading.

Bowling for Columbine explores the connection between racism and fear. In the film, there is a distinct connection between racism from white Americans to black Americans and we also see that this connection comes through fear of black Americans through the US media coverage. It shows how TV shows like Cops demonize black Americans and show them as criminals. Also how poorly the American media represent the white mans paranoia of the black man. At the start of the film, Michael Moore opens a bank account at a local bank in Michigan and receives a free gun. When Moore fills out the application form, he purposely draws the attention of the audience to the word Caucasian'. This word refers to a white person and reflects on the ethnicity' clause of the application. While filling in the document, Moore says that he can't spell ‘Caucasian' or is trying to ask why the potential gun owners ethnic background is required when you're giving free arms. The lady at the bank quickly points out to Moore that the ethnicity clause' is not an issue with him. Meaning that if he had black-coloured skin that he'd have an issue. This is one of the several examples of America's fear of the black person. But where does this fear come from? and why are black people especially targeted? One solution to these questions is the media. For example the media targeting and portraying the black people as dangerous. In the next example the media even goes so far to say that ‘Killer bees' also called ‘Africanized bees' are attacking households throughout the US. These Africanized bees are originally from Africa and have gotten to the US after being brought to South America. The Africanized bees are said to be different from the normal more gentler and kinder European bees. This shows that the American media even portrays more aggressive bees as bees that originated from Africa and they are positioning the viewers to respond to black people as being aggressive and violent and just bad people.

In conclusion Michael Moore