"SiCKO" in 500 new theaters this weekend....See it, or see it again, and again and again...

[marmar]

from MichaelMoore.com:


Thursday, July 19th, 2007
'Sicko' in Top 5 Grossing Docs of All Time -- This Weekend it's "'Sicko' Night in America!"... from Michael Moore


Friends,

Good news! "Sicko," after less than three weeks in national release, has become one of the top five grossing documentaries of all time! So, this coming weekend, the distributor is expanding the movie by opening it in nearly 500 new theaters in small cities all over the country (for a total of nearly 1,200 screens nationwide)! From Rapid City to Carson City, from Gettysburg to Pearl Harbor, from Juneau to Battle Creek -- they're all getting "Sicko" tomorrow (Friday). Scores of cities that never have a documentary come to their local theater will now be able to see this one. It's happening all thanks to you who live in the larger cities and have supported "Sicko" so strongly. It's led the studio to say, "Let's make more prints and ship them to Oshkosh (and Beaverton and Brattleboro and Sault Ste. Marie and...)." The entire country goes "Sicko" in less than 48 hours! (Check here for the complete list of theaters showing "Sicko" in North America.)

So, friends, this is it. This is the weekend to go see "Sicko" if you haven't seen it. I get a lot of letters from people saying they plan to "get around" to seeing it "soon." Well, soon is here! Trying to get theaters to give us screens when we are up against huge summer blockbusters is an almost impossible task. "Sicko" won't be around forever. And if you're waiting for the DVD, ask anyone who's seen "Sicko" -- this is a movie you want to see with a crowd of people in a theater.

So let's pack the movie houses this weekend! Send an email to everyone you know, call your friends and tell them, "It's 'Sicko' Night in America!"

And, to show my thanks to all of you who'll go see "Sicko" this weekend, I'm going to send one of you and a guest on a free weekend to the universal health care country of your choice! That's right. You'll get to pick one of the three industrialized countries featured in the movie where, if you get sick, you get help for free, no matter who you are. All you have to do is send us your ticket stub (make sure it says "Sicko" on it and has the name of the theater and this weekend's date on it -- Friday, Saturday or Sunday - July 20th, 21st, 22nd). Attach the stub to a piece of paper with your name, address, phone number and email and send it to: 'Sicko' Night in America, 888c 8th Avenue, Suite 443, New York, NY 10019. (Yes, you have to use that old 18th century device called the U.S. Postal Service, and it has to be postmarked on or by Tuesday, July 24th). First prize is a weekend in the city of your choice: Paris, London or Toronto. This includes airfare, hotel, meals and, most exciting, a representative from their fine universal health care system who will give you a personal tour so you can see how they treat their fellow citizens. You'll meet people who pay nothing for college and citizens who are in the fourth week of their six-week paid vacation. Oh, and you'll have time to see the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben or whatever they have in Toronto that is old and tall. (If you don't have a passport, we'll pay for that, too!)

Canadians who are reading this -- you're probably thinking, "Hey, what about us? Where do we get to go?" Quit complaining! You're already there! But just to make it up to you -- and to prove we don't hold it against you for smugly walking out of a hospital with the same amount of money in your wallet that you went in with -- we'll let you participate in the drawing, too.

Thanks again to everyone who has gone to see "Sicko." Take a friend or two this weekend and celebrate "'Sicko' Night in America."

Yours,

Michael Moore

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?id=218

[MuseRider]

1. Interesting

the movie company that provides all the movies in my city had said that they were not going to show it. We had to protest and make a lot of noise to get F 9/11 here but this time they just said no. Now, after it looks to be making a bunch of money and they see they can jump in on that they quietly open it here. I guess if you can't obstruct the truth you can at least make a buck off of it.

[marmar]

2. Greed conquers all....

:toast:

[frogcycle]

3. I saw Sicko thursday night

This film is much MORE than all the buzz about it suggests. It is brilliant.

Yes, it tackles the travesty of for-profit healthcare companies making decisions about people's healthcare based on their own profit motive. And it tackles it well.

But it does so much more than that. It asks "who are we?" that we allow this. It is a follow-up to one of his earlier books, "Dude, Where's My Country?"

It was a very moving experience - not just because of empathy for the people victimized by "the system" but as a call to service - to take back what was once a country "for the people" and make it that once again. It contrasted love and kindness in other countries to greed and avarice in ours. A tough message, to be sure, but one that needs to be told again and again until it is no longer valid. And it delivers it without getting shrill, without being overly accusatory of anyone. It just lays out the big picture and how the design of the system results in inappropriate output and says "we need to redesign the system."

Kudos to Michael Moore.



ps: I think this post will do for his Algae Award writeup - stand by!

[marmar]

5. "It asks "who are we?"

Yup. To me, that was the larger, more important, overarching theme of the film. From education to child care to health care to everything, how me-oriented a country have we become? Do we just not give a damn about the common good, only what's good for us and ours?

[frogcycle]

6. o-tay! Mr. Moore has been awarded

to heck with Oscars and Cannes Film Festival awards - he got another Algae Award!


:)

[Joanne98]

4. YAY! It made it to my theatre!

[dalaigh lllama]

7. Just saw it last night

Thanks to a post on DU the other day that said it was coming to more theaters, and lo and behold, it had finally come here.

Amazing to see, the folks he talked to in Canada, Britain, France -- all seemed to take their universal health care for granted as much as we take for granted our "socialist" systems like "free" libraries. We are so "screwn" here!

[marmar]

8. It would be nice to be able to take universal health care for granted, wouldn't it?

:cry: Screwn indeed.

[Lindsey]

9. I'm fortunate enough to live in L.A. where we got it the opening weekend

I saw it then, I saw it with another friend on the 4th of July, and I plan to see it again this weekend to help with ticket sales and to support Michael.

[marmar]

10. Same in Detroit....

I saw it preview weekend.