Roger & Me

[MLE]

I'm currently enrolled in a CAPP Government class, our current assignment is to write a paper on how a movie relates to government. I picked Michael Moore's Roger & Me, since I do like Michael Moore and we already watched Bowling For Columbine and F 9/11 in class. I liked it, but I didn't think it was as good as the other 2 I've seen.

Anyway, I was wondering if any of you have seen the movie and could help me get some ideas. So far, I'm writing it on capitalism/outsourcing of jobs and, of course, the 1st amendment/the right to be able to make a movie like that.
It's a pretty good start, but out teacher said he'd like to have 3 or 4 strong themes in our paper. Do any of you guys have any suggestions or ideas for some other themes I could discuss a little more in depth??

Thanks, I really appreciate it!!! :)

[TN al]

1. Been a while since I've seen it...

...but don't poverty and race both have large rolls in what he talks about?

[tsakshaug]

2. Pets or meat?

That was the sequal (actually about and extra 15 min tacked onto the end.
Desperation about the lack of jobs
The change in corperations from being good employers and citizens to making money for stockholders

[MLE]

3. thanks, those are all good

I'll cover poverty and jobs under the capitalism part.

But i still need more, are there any different topics that relate to government that I can't think of?

[democracyindanger]

4. Roger & Me wasn't really about government

so it's kind of a hard topic to roll into it. Maybe corporate welfare?

[MLE]

7. yeah...

it wasn't really about government primarily, but I guess, as with anything. you can connect it to government somehow.

[warrens]

11. what occurs to me is the govt trying to

Turn the closed plant into a theme park. Autoworld or something. They ended up spending millions that could have gone to creating jobs or attracting a new tenant to one of the dumbest ideas ever.

I mean, they could have spent some of that money helping that lady that got tossed on the street on Xmas eve. Ya know? What kind of priorities does govt have when it will spend millions on an obvious boondoggle, but not a penny to help the worst off.

[MLE]

12. yes!!

thank you!!!! That is a GREAT idea! :D

[hollywood926]

5. I haven't seen it in ages, but...

Bob Eubanks was in it and he made a racial epithet. :-)

I would definitely include themes of class and race!

[dean_dem]

6. That movie definitely wasn't as political as his later ones...

...but a major topic in that movie deals with the disparities between the haves and the have-nots in Flint. Roger (GM President guy-I forget his name)was secluded in his private clubs while people that worked for him were struggling to put food on the table. You could talk about that a little bit.

[mr_hat]

8. The Rabbit Lady epitomized the evil of capitalism.

Personified it, even. Poor bunnies...

[MLE]

9. yes, I agree

that was disturbing

[proud2BlibKansan]

10. The lady with the rabbits

lots of hidden meaning in that segment.

And the eviction guy.

[NightTrain]

13. I saw it theatrically in 1989.

I still remember at the end of the film, when the caption read that GM's P.R. flak had been laid off, the audience burst into spontaneous applause. And this was at a 10-screen multiplex, not an art house!

Hard to believe there was a time when 10 screens qualified as a multiplex, huh? :eyes:

[Nevernose]

14. A few (non-rabbit inspired) ideas

Elements of Nader and/or the Green Party evident in the movie, specifically how the government should be run at a local level. Think of how the city would do anything to suck GM's collective prick.

Marriage between gov't and business. What role, if any, does government have in the regulation of modern business and what, if anything, should be done to maximize the effeciency of such a relationship?

What are the effects a business can have on a city beyond the numbers of economics, specifically the effects that a lack of employment can have on housing, education, health care, and simple daily survival?

[Danmel]

15. It sent me (literally) into Labor

We rented that movie the week my daughter was due and we were watching it and I went into labor. It must have been sympathetic for the workers who got canned in Flint. We returned it a week late and the video store guy ( alittle local store that of course is long gone) didn't charge us for it when we told him why it was late.

[ikojo]

16. It's just not about the outsourcing of jobs but the wanton

disregard for the people who helped make GM the company it is today...it's workers.

Capitalism cares only about the bottom line and not the lives that are destroyed in the name of growth.