Micheal Moore has brought the genre of documentaries into the mainstream through techniques and controversial issues, discuss.

Michael Moore’s documentaries have fascinated people around the world. They include conventions of a typical documentary such as they contain a good story, contain dramatic suspense and contain confrontation. However it’s the more different techniques he uses that makes his documentaries the most recognisable and popular.

Moore creates typical expository documentaries in which he talks to the audience directly, they offer a particular viewpoint and uses persuasive techniques to influence the audience. Moore’s documentaries have come across as controversial particularly in America, this is because of how he presents them to the extreme, using imagery and theories that could shock or interest his audiences. For example in Fahrenheit 9/11 he openly questions the innocence of the US government and in Bowling for Columbine at one stage subtlety contradicts the Constitution.

Moore’s use of footage and editing is also considered to be innovative, for example, in Bowling for Columbine, Moore uses two contrasting scenes back-to-back, one, and over the top politician claiming Marilyn Manson and everything he stands for is a direct cause of the catastrophic evens that happened in Columbine, juxtaposed with shots of Manson himself, presented with normality, with a large amount of sympathy for the tragic event. When asked what he would say to the students of Columbine, he replied with: “I wouldn’t say a single word to them; I would listen to what they have to say, and that’s what no one did”. The way Moore edited this sequence was very clever, he used the Politician to symbolise the US government, trying to persuade the audience to believe they where trying to push the blame away from them.

Similarly, the “Wonderful World” sequence in Bowling for Columbine directly after an interview with Evan McCollum, in which he states that the vast amount of weapons of mass destruction that where built near Columbine for the purpose of defending the US, Moore shows a montage of the American foreign policy decisions in which the US is the obvious aggressor. For example when Clinton bombed what he believed was a weapons factory in Sudan which actually turned out to be a factory for making aspirin. This sequence is then juxtaposed with the song “What a Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong playing in the background. This scene emphasizes Moore’s views on the US government and uses the key convention ‘the shock factor’ to help the audiences approve of his perception.
Other uses of the ‘shock factor’ includes a scene in which Moore himself gets his hands on a free gun, extremely easily from a local bank, at the same time as showing statistics of US gun-related deaths of 11,127 per year contrasted against Japans 39.

In his recent documentary Sicko, Moore uses a technique in which he shows his audiences real people who cannot afford the treatment they need in the US. He takes them to Canada and the UK where they are given free treatment and cheap medication, the reaction of the group of people he took was the shock factor of the film. They were in tears and disbelief as they realised how poorly treated they had been back home.

Moore’s films contain a large amount of dramatic suspense, making the audience feel different emotions and reactions to what he is presenting on screen. For example at the beginning of Fahrenheit 9/11 Moore introduces his film with a black screen, to emphasize his use of sound; screams, sirens, crashes and people in despair - the sounds of the 9/11 attack. This opening sequence was used to extract the audiences deepest emotions about the event, this makes Moore’s documentaries different and innovative, using extreme footage, sound and editing to attract his audiences into seeing his point of view.

In conclusion although Moore has been criticized for his documentaries being too one-sided, personal and graphic, it does not change the fact that the styles he uses make the documentaries popular in the mainstream, and are very innovative. His films are more eye catching than the normal documentary as he tells a different side to the story, speaking the unspeakable.