I, for one, have never considered Michael Moore to be a documentarian. A film essayist, an op-ed filmmaker, yes, but not a documentarian. Putting him in the same category as the great social documentarians has never even crossed my mind, so it didn’t even occur to me to think of a lack of an outreach campaign. Then again, even Rush Limbaugh can take a moment to tell his acolytes to bug their representatives, so… He does have his “Health Care Proposal” and a series of Links and Resources on his website, but if he’s really claiming to spur people to action, he should be taking the opportunity to lead the charge beyond just links.

If you had looked, you would have seen that I spent several years working at the Center for Social Media at American University. In my work there, we did a significant amount of work discovering and highlighting the strategies that filmmakers use to seed social change using films. There are a number of strategies and in my post, I mentioned some passing examples of films that have had some measure of success in this arena. Not only have other filmmakers blazed this trail, but for filmmakers who do not wish to get bogged down in that kind of work, there are organizations that will pick up the outreach baton and run with it on behalf of the project (Outreach Extension, Active Voice).

What does an outreach campaign require? Additional funding beyond production and P&A. You can call me names like “amateurish” and perhaps you are right, but I never said anywhere on this blog that filmmakers need to work for free, or should. There is, however, a difference between getting paid a salary and reaping multi-millions. Since I know more than a handful of filmmakers who care about the issues they make films about, I can say unequivocally that there are many who look for and secure additional funding for outreach, create partnerships with issue-oriented nonprofits and philanthropy, some even disguise their marketing as outreach and manage to sell a few more copies of their work for their efforts (Robert Greenwald is a great example of this, and he makes more than most doc filmmakers I know).

My point here is that if a filmmaker cares about an issue, and in the case of Moore, will be making more than most people in the world will ever see in their lifetimes, including many of the subjects in SiCKO, he’d reinvest some of that capital to fund (insert outreach effort here) or go out and secure additional funding. So, either he has morons working for him (which I doubt since I know many people who do and have worked for him), or making change is not a top priority in the creation and distribution of this film. But, please don’t expect me to believe that he never thought of it.

I’d also add that my post assumes that you’ve seen Manufacturing Dissent. I happen to know enough people who have dealt with Moore over the years to feel comfortable that the stripes that Moore reveals unwittingly in that film are accurate. His unwillingness to support other filmmakers, his paranoid view of any transparency and his hypocrisy (all of which are revealed to some degree in that film) all give weight to my argument that universal healthcare is not really his first priority in making SiCKO.

Most filmmakers don’t toil away, spending years of their lives on a project with the hope that it gets into one or two theaters. Most would desire to have their films on the most amount of screens imaginable. If a distributor believes a film has commercial potential that is what dictates that number of prints made and subsequently the number of theaters where it will be projected. The filmmaker as well as the producers, distributors et all, make more money if the film is on greater amount of screens as long as a greater amount of patrons purchase tickets to the movie. And what’s wrong with that?

It seems to be that the indie film crowd is still stuck in the “denying the realities of commerce” mode of thinking that often belies their amateurish mindset. If something makes a lot of money that doesn’t mean that has less valus as a piece of work. Similarly, your comment that the reason why Moore is making this movie is to line his pockets with money is ridiculous and illogical. Michael Moore’s net worth prior to “9/11″, was well over 20 million. Why would he need to continue to go through the motions if his motivation was dictated by greed. It just doesn’t make sense. He doesn’t need the money. But if he makes a lot of money from these movies, so be it. He’s worked hard and earned it. Market forces did not contribute to the success of his films, public caprice did. So if you think he’s doing it for the money and you have a problem with that, then why did you pay to see the movie yourself?