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| A less than desirable health care system gets an unflattering characterization on this satirical poster for Michael Moore's Sicko |
The USA has the world's most expensive health care system, but 50 mil. of its populace do not benefit from it, since they are uninsured; and the majority who are insured can easily end up getting catastrophically bad or no treatment at all.
Sicko is a documentary from great Michigander documentarian Michael Moore (Roger & Me (1989)).
As usual, Moore acts as insistent man-of-the-people himself in the film, and he is in top shape intellectually here with a topic that has his full interest, namely the comparison between the US insurance health care system and the universal health care systems that he portrays in Canada, Cuba and France.
Sicko is an - especially for Americans - exceedingly depressing watch, because it exhibits how atrociously awful the state of affairs are for such a central area of every American's life. SPOILER Emotionally the film peaks with the section of how the weakest US patients are dumped on sidewalks. Another strong segment shows sick 9/11 heroes finding treatment in Cuba.
Luckily Sicko also has loads of welcome humor, especially coming from Moore himself, who plays his assumed naive Moore-American role to perfection. The filmmaker is thorough, passionate and a bit didactic, - but he has a hell of a strong case in Sicko, which may be his best film. It is role-model activist documentary filmmaking.
Watch a trailer for the film here
Cost: 9 mil. $
Box office: 36.1 mil. $
= Big hit (returned 4.01 times its cost)
[Sicko premiered 19 May (Cannes Film Festival, out of competition) and runs 123 minutes. Shooting took place in Havana, Cuba, Ontario, Detroit, Michigan, New Jersey, Los Angeles, California, London, England, New Mexico, New York, Paris, France and Kansas City, Missouri. The film reportedly received a 17-minute standing ovation after its Cannes premiere. It opened #31 to a 68k $ first weekend in 1 theater in North America, where it peaked at #9 and in 1,117 theaters (different weeks) and grossed 24.5 mil. $ (67.9 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Italy and France, each with 2 mil. $ (5.5 %). The film was nominated for the Best Documentary Oscar, lost to Taxi to the Dark Side. Roger Ebert gave the film a 3.5/4 star review, in line with its rating here. Moore returned with Slacker Uprising (2007, documentary). Sicko is certified fresh at 92 % with a 7.71/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]
What do you think of Sicko?
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