My general dislike for Michael Moore's films had me very sceptical when I first sat down to watch Roger & Me. Moore is outraged that GM Corporation moves production from Flint, Michigan, and thus leaves a city of unemployed and struggling workers - the city it once created for its workers - and studies, with a humorous approach the attempts the city leadership makes at attracting tourism and other new industries. At times, for once, Moore's humour is actually funny.

The plot of the film, if it can be said to have such a thing, is that Moore tries to get in contact with GM CEO Roger Smith to invite him to see Flint for himself. The task can be seen as ridiculous, but his means to complete it are even more so. His initial approach is to send a letter adressed directly to 'Roger Smith, CEO of GM'. When no reply is given (what a shock, 'ey?), he walks into the GM headquarters dressed like a homeless and heads striaght for the elevator where he starts fooling around. When security comes to him he is shocked that Mr. Smith is not there to see him that day. My point is not that Moore should not be able to see and interview Roger Smith, but that if he expects to be able to talk to him, he should approach the man and his company in an appropriate manner. Making a polite call and getting an appointment before one shows up in a suit would, for example, probably work a lot better. It should also be noted that some sceptics claim that Moore actually got an appointment with Mr. Smith, but ignored it because that was better suited for the film.

On the ideological plane Moore's inentions are very unclear as well. He has said that the film was a failure since it did not stimulate any interest in development or investment to the town of Flint. Until I heard that interview I had considered the film yet another examplifying attack on the capitalist system, yet another study of how the richer exploit the poorer. When I see the film in its new context, however, it seems even more helpless: hardly anyone I know of ever understood that it had been the intended aim. If, on the other hand, the film is watched as a study of worker exploitation, the low quality of the investigative methods should be considered because drawing general conclusions on the basis of one or two examples is simply not good enough.

But maybe Moore has a point, and maybe the GM Corporation is evil. Maybe, as it appears in the film, Moore's friend was carried out of the shareholders' meeting because he had the wrong political affiliations and maybe Moore should, indeed, have been allowed to speak to the assembly. The problem, or, rarther, my problem, is that I no longer trust him because througout his career, Moore has clipped, edited and lied so many times that I no longer believe any of his claims. If this film was indeed made before his moral fibre was degraded to that of a crook, it is somewhat better than I have implied above. If it contains the same proportion of lies and stupidity as his other films do, it is even worse. In either case, the film appears horribly biased and appears to be aimed at an audience with severely low levels of intellect.