One of the most talked-about documentaries comes out on DVD today, which means there are going to be a lot of new stories about Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9/11.” The Web is full of sites praising and cursing the film, and it’s hard to know what to make of the various statements the movie makes about the Bush administration, the war in Iraq, and various other topics. Adding to the confusion are two new movies critical of “F 9/11” and Moore: “Fahrenhype 9/11” and “Celsius 41.11.”
To help journalists and others sort fact from fiction, there’s now the brand-new FootnoteFahrenheit.com. The site describes itself as
an independent, non-partisan guide to the issues and questions in Michael Moore’s movie Fahrenheit 9/11. It is not a pro-Michael Moore site and it is not an anti-Michael Moore site, though some may view parts in such a light. It is simply something to help people who walked out of the movie with questions about what they saw. It also should be useful for anyone who wants to know more about what the movie has to say before or instead of seeing it.
Footnote Fahrenheit is an offshoot of one of my favorite sites, Footnote.tv. Both Footnote sites are run by Stephen Lee, a lawyer who used to be a journalist (for The Chicago Tribune, the Dallas Morning News, and the Detroit Free Press). In a Poynter column two years ago, I praised Footnote.tv for providing context and background to current events mentioned on such shows as “Saturday Night Live” and “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.”
The main way to navigate the Footnote Fahrenheit site is an index that looks like a table of contents, with each item describing something from the film. Click on a topic and you will find a description of what’s in the movie and an explanation of what is accurate and what isn’t, as well as general thoughts.
Lee, in a telephone interview, told me he created the new site to help those who had seen the movie understand some of the points raised by it. He uses news accounts, government documents, and other resources to explain what’s seen on the screen.
In addition to a nagging desire to know more about some of the questions raised in the movie, one particular item convinced Lee of the need for this site. It was a soundbite of Bush saying: “This is an impressive crowd of the haves and have mores. Some people call you the elite, I call you my base.”
Lee says he gasped when he saw that, as did others in the crowd. He decided to do some follow-up research and found that the quote had been taken out of context. Footnote Fahrenheit’s “Bush Quotes in Context” says that “Bush is not saying this to a secret gathering of Republican donors, but to attendees at a non-partisan fund-raiser for charities run by the Archdiocese of New York. Both Bush and Al Gore gave remarks at the 2000 Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation dinner on October 19, 2000, and both mocked themselves and their own images.”
Among the dozens of scenes and events that the site tries to explain or amplify:
- Saudi Arabia’s human rights record (part of Moore’s repeated criticism of the Bush family’s ties to the kingdom). Lee’s research shows that “Saudi Arabia committed about a third more executions in this period than the United States, though the United States has a population about 10 times as large as Saudi Arabia’s.”
- President Bush’s reaction to the news of the 9/11 attacks (the film shows him sitting quietly for several minutes at the elementary school where he was told). Lee has built a timeline of Bush’s activities and travels for the day.
- The hunt for Osama Bin Laden (“F 9/11” accuses the Bush administration of letting the Al Qaida leader get away by not putting enough troops in Afghanistan). Lee has a backgrounder on the military’s efforts to capture the Al Qaida leader.
Lee says that a lot of what Moore does is “not necessarily right or wrong, but is just put out there. A lot of people are left wondering about what they just saw.” It was to help these viewers that he created Footnote Fahrenheit.
Lee calls his site “some kind of blend of reporting and research” and says his skills as both a reporter and lawyer came in handy. Asked how he was able to build the site without a DVD to keep track of what was in the movie, he explains that he saw the movie twice and the second time he took his old reporter’s notebook and made extensive notes. Later, he asked his sister-in-law and brother-in-law to confirm some quotes and scenes when they went to see the film.
Later this week, he promises a free book version, in PDF form, filling about 200 pages.
If you are curious how anyone (especially a lawyer) could spend so much time on a labor of love, or if you have a suggestion or correction, Lee welcomes your thoughts at newsaic@hotmail.com.
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