Michael Moore’s controversial new documentary, Fahrenheit 9/11 — a scathing indictment of White House actions after the Sept. 11 attacks — has won the Palme D’Or at the 57th annual Cannes Film Festival, the first documentary to ever do so.
“I have this great hope that things are going to change,” said Moore after tearing into Bush with his emotion-charged documentary in the run-up to November’s presidential election.
With Moore’s customary blend of humour and polemic, Fahrenheit 9/11 accuses the Bush camp of stealing the 2000 election, overlooking terrorism warnings before Sept. 11 and fanning fears of more attacks to secure Americans’ support for the Iraq war.
For information on the other winners at Cannes, click on the Indie Wire.
Monthly Archives: May 2004
The Summer Movie Season Has Finally Arrived
How Green Is My Valley? Shrek 2 Has Monster Opening
 Weekend Box Office Guestimates: Blue = High | Red = Low – Estimates In Millions |
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Finally, the summer movie season has arrived! Shrek 2 looks to be on its way to a record May opening, having gleaned $49,445,000 in its first three days of release, with $28,500,000 in box office receipts on Friday night alone.
Compare that to either Troy’s or Van Helsing’s rather anemic opening weekends, of $45.8 and $54 million, respectively.
In reporting on the opening of Shrek 2, The Hollywood Reporter asks and answers, How green is the weekend tally?, while Gitesh Pandya at Box Office Guru suggests that Shrek 2 looks “to inject some green into the early summer box office,” as does Reagen Sulewski at Box Office Prophets.
Who Reads Blogs? A Provocative Sampling of Blogger Habits
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According to a survey of 17,159 weblog readers, conducted by BlogAds, 61% of blog readers responding to the survey were over 30, and 75% make more than $45,000 a year.
Other interesting survey findings include, that in the last six months:
- 50% have spent more than $50 online on books.
- 47% have spent more than $500 online for plane tickets.
- 54% get their news online.
- 21% are themselves bloggers.
- 50% have contributed more than $50 to a cause or candidate,
and 5% have contributed more than $1000.
The full survey results are available here.
Top 10 Conspiracy Theories of 2003-2004
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Is the end of the world imminent? Have we run out of oil? Prior to 9/11 what dealings did the United States have with Iraq? Did the Bush administration deliberately allow the 9/11 terrorist attacks to happen?
If U.S. Justice Department head John Ashcroft stopped flying commercial aircraft two months before 9/11, and several employees at the Pentagon cancelled their flight plans the night of September 10, citing ‘security concerns’, how is it that the first reaction of President Bush to the destruction of the World Trade Center was “there’s one terrible pilot.”
Conspiracies abound. How near is the truth?
Mike Ward, a regular contributor to Pop Matters (the newest link, under A&E) suggests answers to each of the questions above, in the process linking to any number of economists, new urbanists and future theorists.