ROGER, MIKE AND ME (A Christmas Carol)
In the beginning was Roger. Then God grew a pain in his ass, and Mike was created. Then I saw “Roger and me”, and the original seed was committed. Now is the time for the three of us to meet like we always planned, without ever being quite able to make it.
“ROGER AND ME” AND ME (1989)
I first saw “Roger and me” at the time it came out. I had heard the filmmaker had sold his house so as his movie could see the light of day and I was intrigued. It was Christmas time, I remember it was advertised as a Christmas comedy. I saw it… And I accidentally took this weird bullet of an unknown brand with Roger’s name on it right here in my heart. I didn’t call it love at first sight, for little did I know there’d be a story. I just thought : “That’s it, this guy’s a genius, he’s down and out, I’ll never hear from him again”. I remember neglecting to look for further information, like you don’t want to get involved with this fascinating stranger you know you’re not to see ever again.
Christmas comedy ? What Christmas comedy ? It was mean like a Sex Pistols single, angry like a song from Dylan, smooth like a razorblade, sad like the bleakest landscape, bare like a tragedy, urgent, raw, lucid, desperate.
I remember coming out of the theater with my head full of haunting images, scenes and songs I was never to forget. The juxtapositions. The crosscuts. The building crumbling down because of General Motors and a building crumbling down because of terrorists. The oily, robotic PR man apologetically explaining the necessity of layoffs and finally getting the vengeful, cathartic caption : “Laid off”. The innocent, happy-go-lucky favourite “And wouldn’t it be nice to live together/ In the kind of world where we belong ?”, and the broken man who had innocently liked it before he went mental in the kind of world where he belonged. Emotions strong but transient ? I used to love that unfortunate song. Mike crushed it. Because of his spell, I could never, never listen to it the same way again.
I can’t remember my thoughts as clearly, but I found them perfectly encapsulated in this IMDB user comment : “For instance Anita Bryant, Bob Eubanks and Pat Boone are 3 disgusting American celebrities who basically are hired by GM to fool the town into thinking everything’s nice at Flint Michigan. In fact Reagan as shown in the movie uses Flint basically as a campaign ploy to elect himself during the 1980's. It's disgusting. Now the plot deals with General Motors and their disgusting actions of laying off well basically everyone who works for them in the factory. Even amidst Union groups like UAW , and booming profits, GM pulls the most disgusting acts reported in corporate history.” Yes, this very blunt and fresh impression to “get it” was mine, I felt this brisk sense of outrage and moral indignation that comes off from this stuttering of the words “disgusting” and “basically”.
It was strange. I already knew everything there is to know about corporate America. But what is knowledge I ask you ? This movie was growing me fists. It was also growing me hands. While making me more anti-capitalist than ever, it was soothing something in me and teaching me non violent struggle. Beyond the drastic divorce between the views of the "haves" and "have-nots", I could grasp the hellish decline of the very values America was built upon : capitalism and self-reliance, with the very values America was built upon : democracy and the right to the pursuit of happiness. Roger had split America in two. Yet no revolution was required : just the courage to take the erosion of the American dream in exchange for a moral demand. Roger isn’t put to shame because he’s a CEO, and the legitimacy of big corporations aiming at profit is not questioned. Roger is put to shame because he’s guilty of three crimes : he feels entitled to make unlimited profits, whatever the consequences, he can remorselessly devastate an entire city with a single act of corporate greed, and he refuses to face his acts and to be held accountable for them. He’s not merely rich. He’s disgusting. Basically.
The storm inside was complex and interspersed with rainbows. Was it because of the time of the year ? Was it because of the devastating power of the final scene where Roger reads “A Christmas Carol” in honeyed voice in front of a silent and respectful assembly while Dickensian woe strikes a jobless evicted worker, who shouts and curses profanity as she has her Christmas tree thrown in the gutter ? I remember I thought of Michael Moore as the heir of these XIXth century Christian socialist artists, like Victor Hugo and Charles Dickens, who didn’t overthrow but testified, and couldn’t separate politics from spirituality. Sure enough, this young man looked more angry and scathing than anything else. The fake “angels” of Flint, Eubanks, Boone, Bryant, “would probably have persuaded Jimmy Stewart to go ahead and commit suicide”, as a critic put it, with this old boostered spirit which had become but a vast and corrupting lie. Still… Through the bitter sarcasm in the end credits, as Bob Eubanks was uttering his anti-Semitic joke, I could hear the filmmaker’s voice superimposed to Pat Boone’s, singing “I’m proud to be an American / Part of a great democracy”, and I sensed a possible hope under the parody, something sincere behind the mocked stereotype. Wouldn’t it be nice, to live together…? When I finally found my way out of Flint, I began to think of this anti-“It’s a Wonderful Life” bomb as a weird, pending Christmas Carol.
I can’t remember whether it was snowing.
SCROOGE AND HIS NEMESIS
Like all carols, “Roger and me” is a song of praise for the power of the Christmas spirit, and, unlike in all carols, the Christmas spirit doesn’t succeed. Still, the story is told.
Is Roger evil ? Little doubt about that. Like his ancestor Ebenezer Scrooge, he’s a heartless, mean-spirited miserly person… a skin”flint”. But not only. In the Christmas scene, he coldly hijacks the very words written to save his soul for the benefit of his own facade. That’s silent evil laughter. Making a mockery of redemption is the mark of the devil. Besides, if Scrooge could be redeemed, it’s because he was frank in his ugliness, and therefore honest enough to confront the Three Spirits : whereas Roger has already met them – and laughed at them. Scrooge’s redemption was a piece of cake really.
Is Mike good ?…
If “Roger and me” is such a UFO, it’s because it’s a documentary with a plot, or rather, a socio-political stance intermingled with a near fictional account of a… stalking ? tracking ? ambush ? investigation ? All of these words have been used in various reviews to describe what makes Mike go after Roger. One of them even talks of an “odyssey”. But the word that really stands out is, overwhelmingly, “quest”. And a quest it is, for Roger is as out of reach as the cup which contained Jesus’s blood. And like all true quests this one is bound to fail : no knight ever approached the Grail, and it's clear early on that Mike isn't going to be granted entry into Roger’s inner sanctum. Moreover, you don’t implore someone like this dressed like that. So, the meaning lies elsewhere : why ?
Here the range of the interpretations in the reviews is apparently wide : to “make the rejection politically symbolic” ; to “show corporate America's responsibility to the country's citizens” ; to “discover why GM would want to do such a thing” ; to “talk things over” ; to “get an interview with Roger Smith” ; to “take Mr. Smith on a tour of Flint and to persuade him of G.M.'s responsibility” ; to “confront Smith with the consequences of corporate policy” ; to “shove a mike in the face of these moguls and giants of industry who are asking us to pay for their pleasure” ; to “talk with these individuals”.
But it all comes down to deciding whether the mike matters or not. Whether Mike looks for an explanation or an upset conscience, demands accountability or awareness, wants to talk or to show. In fact, Mike himself has answered : “My idea was to get Roger Smith to come to Flint - for a day. And I'd drive him around in a Ford Econoline van - I didn't want it to look like a commercial for GM. I'd take him around and show him all the sights: Fred the eviction man, and the 'bunny lady' who turns to her pet rabbits as a source of meat.” So the mike was for the people, not for Roger ? Was the whole point of the quest what we were shown along the way then ? Maybe. Still, the mike is for Roger on the poster. Or rather, for his empty armchair.
To fully understand the meaning of the quest, one has to realize that the one who makes the movie is Roger, not Mike. For, beyond “why ?”, there is “why not ?”. If Roger had met with Mike, there would have been no movie. A critic goes as far as writing : “It's likely that if Roger Smith had simply granted Moore an interview back in 1988, Moore would be known today as Michael who?” He may well be right. Why didn’t Roger take the mike ? Why not ?
At the beginning of the movie, Roger is a distant god stalked by an insolent scoundrel. The more it goes, the more we see the sloppy washout make civil efforts only to be ignored or driven off, the more we wonder why talking to a CEO is so absurdly hard. By refusing the confrontation, Roger reverses the situation and makes himself a naked Emperor, and a godlike figure standing for just anger out of a pesky gad-fly. A Nemesis.
A personification of divine vengeance, Nemesis punishes the criminals, and brings down all those who indulge into any kind of excess (hubris), thus challenging the gods instead of accepting their human condition. For hubris is what makes Roger a criminal. From a Mike interview, given at the time the movie was released (New York Newsday, January 25, 1990) :
Q. So what would you have done if you were in Roger Smith's shoes?
A. Keep the factories open.
Q. Even if it's unprofitable?
A. That's the point! They made 5 billion dollars last year! They are profitable! They want to be more profitable! They're greedy! You will never hear them utter the words “enough is enough.” They'll close down all the factories in this country if they believe that they're going to make more money in Mexico and Taiwan.
But Mike’s version is nearer to the milder face worn by the goddess of Vengeance under the Christian influence : the moral law. “I never read anything by Marx, he confessed in the same interview. I'm embarrassed to say that. I just grew up with a basic set of values that deal with what I think is fair and just.” A vengeful spokesman for his folks, Mike had no hateful personal motives. “Roger and me” ultimately was “The story of a rebel and his mike.” Is it fortuitous that said rebel also happened to be called Mike ? I think the mike was, in very concrete terms, an extension of the filmmaker’s body. A held out hand. His hand. Would Roger ever take it ? How long could he cut off Mike’s mike ?
“ROGER B. AND ME” (2004)
You and I have grown older. You went on to murder people, I went on to win awards. You and I have grown bigger. With great power comes great responsibility. I hadn’t waited for Spiderman’s uncle to tell you, Roger B.
Way back in 1989, in a radio interview, I stated my first attempt was a failure, since it did not stimulate any interest in development or investment to Flint. I really thought I could save a town with a movie then, and now I think I can save a country with another. And if this new one doesn’t fulfil its purpose either, I’ll consider it a failure as well. Regardless of the tributes, regardless of the shock waves, regardless of the pouring awards. I still want work for my town and democracy for my country. And if so many people are obsessed with my “spins”, it’s because I’m the first one to treat the international symbol of liberty I created like a vulgar flyer. You see : I’m just as conceited, and just as humble as ever. Still plagued by sacred madness.
I still wear that baseball cap and shoddy appearance. I take care not to shave before I do interviews, and not to clean my nails before I have a picture session. And I’m still fond of these sloppy clothes that sure don’t make me look any slimmer. You can say I’m marketing my image just like any other star, of course I’m marketing my image just like any other star, but did you ever wonder why on earth I would stick to such an image ? The very image that once got me thrown out of your Gatsby parties and yacht clubs ? Still the same old me, as fat as ever, from the weight I put on in the 1980s when I lived on $99 a week in unemployment and subsisted on cheap, starchy foods. Still bearing in my body the scars from your kind of policies, just as I’m sure the evicted woman still remembers her Christmas eve, and still being jeered at by your Christian supporters for what you’ve done to me.
You have not changed either, Roger B. You grow endless profits at any cost, you raise your own wages in an exorbitant way, you spend 42 % of your time on holiday, you disregard the reports that should alarm you, you recoil into regression when disaster happens, you only have a candid, vague notion whether there are WMDs in Iraq or not. Simply put, you still shirk your responsibilities.
You thought nothing of me in 1989, Roger B, you had nothing to say to me or about me then. What’s with your loudspeakers suddenly ? Why do they howl I’m a rich man, a vile man, why do you suddenly want me to fit in your crowd ? Is it because this time I’ve repelled you ? Is it because I’ve cut off one of your 50, 000 mikes ? What’s got into you, Roger B ? Still the same old me, chasing you, holding out a transitional object to you. But this time I’m not wearing kid gloves, this time you’ve cracked democracy, sold my country, blasted the UN and murdered for good. That’s why I discarded the poster with the flag in flames, even though it was the counterpoint to my title and the aptest one. That’s why I discarded the hand in hand controversy, too sarcastic – or not enough. Look at me, or rather my eyes, holding out the stuff you don’t want to know.
Don’t bear me wrong if I raised my voice a bit, Roger B. With great power… This time I didn’t show you. This time I saw you. This time it’s not a mike, it’s not me, it’s a letter, a letter you wrote. It’s you.
In this “CONFIDENTIAL” letter, people will find the net of your crimes. You will find the net of the people. The same ones. The have nots. Iraqi people cursing like an evicted woman. American soldiers as immoral, as keen on survival as a “pets or meat” woman. Simple, apolitical people who trusted in you and don’t understand how you could fool them in such a way. Youngsters that poverty has compelled to enlist, like poverty had made a derisory salesperson out of a feminist. Corpses at war, as dead as the corpse in Flint laid waste. The only difference is I gave way to them. Lila Lipscomb is the betrayed woman, the harassing woman, the one woman army unsuccessfully knocking at your door. I only witnessed the opening of her eyes, and I was content with helping her on the path I had walked before her. Yesterday and today, all these people are ME, and I am THEM.
The only difference is that my screenings are sold out. My books are sold out. My lectures are sold out. My DVDs are sold out. The only one who hasn’t sold out is me. I’ve used my brand new power to become a real angel : this ordinarily clad dude who comes to a desperate man, and shows him how any ordinary citizen can be vital, useful, essential, and make his part of the world a better place. The only difference is that even if you’re here to stay, it might well not be just you and me. It might just be you and us. Imagine that at Christmas, Roger B : millions of Nemesis on your door. Now isn’t it a wonderful life ?
I bet this year it’ll be snowing.
posted by fear_and_hate_9_11 @ 9:18 AM
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