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Wednesday, July 14, 2004

Canada Welcomes You!

The idea of Michael Moore being an honourary Canadian citizen (via Neale) is absurd, but appealing for the following reasons:


The bizarre thing is that a mayor thinks that he can offer Canadian citizenship to someone. Geez, and I thought Michael Moore was the crazy one.

UPDATE (Jul 14, 08:55 AM PST): Bob Tarantino isn't quite as enthusiastic as I am about the idea.

Posted by Kelvin on July 14, 2004 in Current Affairs | Permalink

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» Bowling For Sarnia from small dead animals
Mike Bradley, the mayor of Sarnia, wants to make Michael Moore an honorary Canadian citizen. Bob Tarantino wants to kick his ass. Over at the Shotgun, commentor Rick McGinnis speculates... It's interesting to think what would have happened to Moore,... [Read More]

Tracked on 2004-07-14 12:52:37 PM

Comments

maybe that's true. In Canada Moore wouldn't have made any splash at all. He would have had a couple of Canada COuncil grants and been forgotten. Not like he would stand out.

Posted by: hilary | 2004-07-14 10:56:36 AM

A few years here and he will be so disillusioned with the cost and the reality of our "good society" that he will move back to the U.S. and join Jenna Bush's election campaign team.

Posted by: colin | 2004-07-14 11:09:16 AM

It's interesting to think what would have happened to Moore, had he been born Canadian.

He'd have been born in Oshawa, the son of a middle management worker at GM. His dad would get him a job, but he'd quit the line after a day. He'd have dropped out of York University, and gotten a job at NOW magazine, where he'd experience a meteoric rise but would suddenly be fired after one too many personality conflicts with publisher Michael Hollett.

He'd turn to filmmaking, parlaying his connections into a short documentary that would get programmed at Images or the Perspectives Canada section at the Toronto International Film Festival, but would never see commercial release, and take several years before getting video release with an independent distributor who went bankrupt with most of the copies still in boxes in their warehouse. (Copies of the DVD of Moore's film, "49th Paral-hell", would turn up in sell-off bins for years.)

Moore's best hope would have been to be Rick Mercer, except that he's nowhere near as charming as Mercer, and we already have one, so he'd basically be relegated to the occasional underpaid rant in This Magazine and sporadic work as a production assistant on American TV movies being shot in Toronto.

Frustrated by the lack of opportunities for a (straight, white, but overweight) cinematic propagandist in this country, he'd move south, where so many other Canadians have found not only opportunity, but the mysterious freedom to dissent publicly in "facist Amerikkka".

Posted by: rick mcginnis | 2004-07-14 11:45:38 AM

Rick: If I wore a hat I'd take it off to you. Eerily accurate. I'd only add a very brief stint at Alliance Atlantis, and a couple of shorts in the Moc Docs festival.

Posted by: Kathy Shaidle | 2004-07-14 12:30:41 PM

Just to add to Hilary's point: Moore's views are so mainstream up here that no one would notice him. He'd have to re-make himself as a neo-Nazi to get attention.

Posted by: Kathy Shaidle | 2004-07-14 12:36:25 PM

Rick McGinnis has it. Move south, like Joe Who.

Posted by: tb | 2004-07-14 6:26:49 PM

Rick McGinnis is dead on. A Canadian Michael Moore would be found working behind the counter at Silver Snail Comics on Queen West, raging against the machine where nobody but the squeegee kids could hear him.

They say 'youth is wasted on the young.' I wonder if 'freedom is wasted on Michael Moore.'

Posted by: Damian | 2004-07-16 11:57:40 AM


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