Michael Moore’s documentary,Capitalism: A Love Story, is his magnum opus and a rousing call to action.  It will make you laugh.  It will make you cry.  It will make you think.  During a recent television interview, Moore told the following story about a speech he gave to the crew on the first day of film-making, imparting his larger vision for the project:

“Why don’t we make a movie that will have everything we want in it.  So much so that no studio will ever want to give me another dime again.  That the large corporations that distribute movies, the theater chains or whatever, will just go, ‘Oh my God, who let him say these things’.  Let’s see if we can just put ourselves out of business, by just going for it.  ROCK N ROLL!!”

Moore succeeds.  I can’t comment on his future business relations with Big Media, but he undoubtedly succeeds in giving us everything he has as a reality film artist.  Little Richard once commented on Jimi Hendrix’s work as a rhythm guitarist in his band, during the mid 1960′s:

“Jimi would have [that guitar] rumpin’ and tumpin’s all up into my toes… make my big toe shoot up into my boot.  Jimi would give it all to you.  That’s what you really want.  All or none.”

In the words of Little Richard, Michael Moore ‘gives it all to us’ in this remarkable film.  He returns to his roots in Roger and Me, going back to Detroit and Flint, Michigan, and the fallen American automobile industry. With 1950′s Super 8 home movies, he takes the narrative back to the glory days of US Capitalism, when an American working class family could live a comfortable lifestyle on the single income of a factory worker.

In turn, the fall of Motor City becomes a metaphor for the larger decline of the American economy during the second half of the twentieth century.  With intelligent use of historical, cinematic, and documentary footage, Moore coherently presents his argument through speeches, dialogue, and screen images:  ’Capitalism is evil’.

What is even more noteworthy than the controversial thesis of the film, that Capitalism is evil, is the basis on which he makes this claim.  For it is not on the basis of a Marxist or any other secular socialist ideology that he primarily condemns Capitalism.  Instead, he condemns the principles of Capitalism as both inconsistent with the basic Christian worldview,  as well as actively antagonistic to and subversive of a Christian based moral culture.   Moore even enrolls both a local Michigan parish Catholic priest and Bishop to support his position.

Moore executes a delicious satire of the Christian Right and its theological synthesis of Biblical fundamentalism with “unregulated free market ideology”, by cleverly dubbing scenes from a popular 1970′s Jesus of Nazareth movie. For example, in one scene where the sick ask Jesus to cure what ails them, Moore dubs dialogue in which Jesus refuses them health care services based on poor their medical history and preconditions.

In the end, however, it is not so much Jesus of Nazareth, but instead long lost footage of Franklin Delano Roosevelt that steels the show.  I don’t know in what vault Moore located this footage; probably in some deep dark dungeon in Midtown Manhattan or Washington, D. C.  Wherever he found it, the effect is undeniable.  FDR articulates a new post-World War II vision that calls for and explicates a second Bill of Rights, and it is powerful.

I don’t think the majority of Americans who view Moore’s film will agree with the idea that “Capitalism is evil”, and that it must be dismantled.  This writer does not endorse such a view himself.  Still, Moore’s film is valuable for compelling the viewer to ask important questions about the foundations of American economy and society, that he or she would not normally be provoked to ask.

These questions are not raised in the New York Times, much less the cable news networks.   With the American public increasingly convinced of the fundamentally dysfunctional character of the US economic system in late 2009, policy initiatives and social movements for reform should be informed by foundational thinking.

This movie is a stimulus to foundational thinking.  But it is also extremely entertaining.  Moore is a tremendous showman.  He knows how to make an audience laugh,  how to pull at their heartstrings, and how to invoke their outrage.  The clever synthesis of reality and fictional footage in the editing is also a treat for the eye.

This is an excellent film.  I highly recommend seeing it in the theaters in order to show support for such a daring artistic endeavor.  If you can’t make it to the cinema, then do not miss it on DVD.