Roger & Me Screening At Lincoln Center

Filmmaker Michael Moore is a guy most people either love or hate, but I’ve never understood why or how anyone could hate his first film, Roger & Me. It’s basically the story of how Roger B. Smith, then the CEO of General Motors shut down plants in Flint, Michigan, moved the work to Mexico and  that move has cost about 30,000 jobs and pretty much ruined the town of Flint, Michigan. And the real kicker is that Smith shut the factories down and moved the labor out of the country when GM was making record profits. He didn’t need to do this, but he wanted to make even more money, so he destroyed an American city to do so.

Moore managed to document all this by filming the people left in Flint and by taking trips to try to get Roger Smith to atone for his actions. The film has equal parts humor, sadness and it shows how a greedy company just doesn’t care about the people working there who helped make it successful. It’s one of my favorite movies and I don’t know how many times I’ve seen it, but I’ve never seen it in a movie theater. So I was really excited when my friend and frequent TWM guest star, Shawn told me there was going to be a screening of the film at a theater in Lincoln Center and that Michael Moore was going to be there to speak about the film and answer questions. I plan my week’s worth of trips and had another plan for tonight, but seeing Roger & Me in a theater in Lincoln Center trumps that idea, so that’s tonight’s destination.

And here we are at Lincoln Center on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

And here's the famous fountain in the center of it. But we're not here to see tourist attractions, we're here to see...

A film. And from the looks of that sign, by George I think we've found it.

Yep, this is the place.

And it's just a short escalator ride, nothing as traumatic as yesterday's ride.

Shawn and I agreed to meet at the box office here.

Here's my ticket, now where's Shawn?

Here he is, decked out in a vintage Roger & Me t-shirt. Shawn grew up in Flint, Michigan, knows Michael Moore and saw the premiere there.

And it's into the theater we go.

Time to get a seat. I've watched Roger & Me many times, but this is the first time I've ever seen it on the big screen.

It's the 50th New York Film Festival this year.

And the movie begins...

Roger & Me.

It's funny, I've never seen this at the end of the movie. Usually when the credits start rolling I shut it off at home. But tonight I watched it till the end and after the credtis it reads: "This film cannot be shown within the city of Flint."

"All the movie theaters have closed."

Afterwards there was an onstage interview with Michael Moore. It turns out he financed Roger & Me by selling his house, holding bingo parties in Flint and from grants from the city. It was a big gamble and it paid off big. Roger & Me was the first documentary film to reach a huge mass audience and paved the way for documentary films to be thought of as mainstream movie entertainment. And I've had my own Michael Moore moment and you can read  about that here. It was a great night and thanks to Shawn for the hat tip!

Further Reading: My Upper West, Top Documentary Films and rogerebert.com.

And wouldn’t it be nice to live together,
In the kind of world where we belong.

Surprise link, click on it...I dare you!

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Questionable Linkage!

Once again there's dueling questions between myself and DJ Gidget over at her blog, check it out, it's a lot of fun. And don't forget to tune in to the "Secret Weapon" on Woody Radio, where "Boris" picks the tunes and DJ Gidget spins them! It's on right now, so tune in! And check out the lawn jockey photo that Gidget sent in featuring her son Jack and the neighbors lawn jockey decked out for Halloween.

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'21' Club Photo From Biff!

Biff commented yesterday that she had lunch across from the '21' Club the last time she was in New York and here's a photo she took from the aforementioned lunch. Maybe on her next trip we'll have a drink in there together! Thanks for the photo, Bifferoonie!