Starring Michael Moore, Phil Knight. Written and Directed by Michael Moore.
The Big One is a reference from Moore's No. 1 bestseller Downsize This as the name Moore wants to replace the United States of America with, to make the country's name sound more punchy and ominous sounding. It is of course meant as a joke, but a joke is the vehicle Moore uses to make most of his points, in this case America's obsession with being the numero uno super power. The movie is a documentary Moore made during his 47-city tour to promote his book. Moore made his mark as the left-wing hit man in the highest grossing documentary ever, Roger and Me, about his search for GM CEO Roger Smith. He was seeking an explanation for GM's destruction of Flint jobs despite being wildly profitable, and the effects on the lives of those downsized workers.
While Random House tried to keep him under wraps to prepare for his book signings, Moore took the opportunity to visit corporations making billions in profit who are downsizing their workforces. Moore chose to visit cities that most authors would ignore. One city made the Pay Day chocolate bar, and was closing its plant and relocating to Mexico. He snuck in to talk with a manager with a hidden camera and mike on him, and learned that the better the employees had done in earning ample profit for the company, the more likely their jobs would be moved offshore. Moore thought this was insane too. Later they visited Rockford, Ill., the lowest ranked city in America according to Business magazine, taking Moore's hometown Flint's distinction. Here he meets a lady just laid off from her Ford truck sales job, and Moore touchingly gives her a hug and some moral support.
Throughout, Moore interjects almost standup routines, cutting up corporate greed and excuses business people make for downsizing, such as business is only there to make shareholders rich, and the workers have no rights in the equation. He also is great at some humourous cheap shots. A great sequence out of left field is showing Steve Forbes on TV, and the fact that he never blinks for over 2 minutes. A sociologist says that people blink at least every 20 seconds and to not do so is "not human." And so Forbes, and his flat tax mantra, becomes an alien plot. By the end, after all CEO's of downsizing companies have dodged Moore, Phil Knight of Nike actually phones in a radio show and invites Moore over for a chat. And Knight does not come off well. Moore records Knight saying that Americans don't really want shoe making jobs (all Nike jobs are overseas in third world developing nations), and that using 14 year-old Indonesian girls at under a $1 a day is really OK - it helps these countries develop, don't you know. I suppose Knight should get some marks for having the guts to face Moore. But his squeeze-as-much-profit-as-you-can philosophy that pervades much of the big business community today does not come off positively. I haven't bought Nike's for a long time, and I certainly won't be again.
Moore videotaped the documentary, and then transferred it to film. The film quality is spotty at times, but it doesn't detract from the film - the film is supposed to be a rough-edge, on-the-spot record of Moore's assaults on various corporations and book signings. The film is often hilarious, and exposes the greed inherent in corporate America's drive for ever increasing profits. But the film is not well focused, including several scenes unrelated to the film's primary theme. For example, Moore arrives at the home of the guitarist of Cheap Trick, and spends a fair chunk of time jamming on the guitar with him. It slows the film down a bit. Overall, the film does nicely expose corporate America's relentless drive for profit regardless of the cost to its workers who are downsized, and is well worth seeing. If you consider Conrad Black and Al Dunlop great human beings, and hold the writings of the Wall Street Journal and the Economist in high esteem, don't bother. You won't like it.
