Independent Films, Film Profiles

Roger & Me
by Michael_Moore

Roger & Me is a 1989 American documentary film directed by independent filmmaker/author Michael Moore. With sarcasm and irony, Moore illustrates the negative economic impact of the late General Motors CEO Roger Smith's summary action of closing several auto plants in Flint, Michigan, costing 30,000 people their jobs and economically devastating the city.Moore begins by introducing himself and his family through 8 mm archival home movies; he describes himself as "kind of a strange child," the Irish American Catholic middle-class son of a General Motors employee assembling AC Spark Plugs. Moore chronicles how GM had previously defined his childhood in Flint, Michigan, and how the company was the primary economic and social hub of the town. He also points out that Flint is the place where the Flint Sit-Down Strike occurred, resulting in the birth of the United Auto Workers. He reveals that his heroes were the Flint natives who had escaped the life in GM's gigantic factories, including the members of Grand Funk Railroad, Casey Kasem, the spouses of Zubin Mehta (Nancy Kovack) and Don Knotts, and "Flint's most famous native son," game show host Bob Eubanks.Initially, he achieves his dream of avoiding factory life, working for a magazine in San Francisco, but this venture fails for him and he ultimately travels back to Flint. As he returns, General Motors announces the layoffs of thousands of Flint auto workers, the jobs of whom will go to cheaper labor in Mexico. GM makes this announcement even though the company is experiencing record profits.Disguised as a TV journalist from Toledo, Ohio, Moore interviews some auto workers in Flint and discovers their strong antipathy to General Motors chairman Roger B. Smith. Moore begins seeking out Smith himself to confront him about the closing of the Flint plants. He tries to visit Smith at GM's headquarters in Detroit, yet he is blocked by building security as Moore hasn't made an appointment. A company spokesman comes to the lobby and exchanges contact information with Moore, promising him to discuss an interview with Smith. Over the course of the film, Moore attempts to track down Smith at the Grosse Pointe Yacht Club and the Detroit Athletic Club, only to be told either that Smith is not there or to leave by employees and security guards.From here, Moore begins to explore the emotional impact of the plant closings on some of his friends. He interviews an auto worker named Ben Hamper who apparently suffered a nervous breakdown on the assembly line and is currently staying at a mental health facility. From here, to the Beach Boys song "Wouldn't It Be Nice?", we see a montage of the urban rubble and decay enveloping Flint, interspersed with newspaper headlines about the increasing layoffs and a news report informing us that the rat population in the city soon outnumbered the human population, causing residents to move away. He also turns his camera to the middle/upper class residents of the more affluent suburbs such as Grand Blanc, who display rather classist and naïve attitudes when it comes to the economic hardships of the city.Here, Moore changes course and turns his camera on the Flint Convention and Visitors Bureau, who are in the process of response by promoting a vigorously incompetent tourism policy. The Bureau, in an effort to lure tourists into visiting Flint, permit the construction of a Hyatt Regency Hotel, a festival marketplace called Water Street Pavilion, and AutoWorld, hailed as the world's largest indoor theme park. These efforts fail, as the Hyatt soon files for bankruptcy, Water Street Pavilion sees most of its stores go out of business, and AutoWorld closes due to a lack of visitors just six months after the grand opening. (AutoWorld would reopen the next summer only to close down again, and in the end was demolished, which is seen in Moore's film The Big One.)Well-known personalities and celebrities are also shown coming to Flint to bring hope to the unemployed, some of them interviewed by Moore. Ronald Reagan visits the town and suggests that former auto workers find employment by moving across the country, though the restaurant where they are meeting has its cash register stolen during Reagan's visit. The mayor pays television evangelist Robert Schuller to preach to the town's unemployed. Pat Boone and Anita Bryant, who have supplied GM with celebrity endorsements, also come to town; Boone tells Moore that Roger Smith is a "can-do" kind of guy. Moore also interviews Bob Eubanks during a fair near Flint, during which he cracks a crude joke.Moore also meets some of the residents of Flint, who are reeling from the economic fallout of the layoffs. We meet a former feminist radio host named Janet who, to find work, joins Amway as a saleswoman. We also meet a former auto worker, angered over the layoffs, who is actually named James Bond. The most famous resident that appears in the film is Rhonda Britton, who sells rabbits for "Pets or Meat" (The scene many believe was the reason Roger & Me received an R-rating features Britton killing a rabbit by beating it with a lead pipe. The rabbit fights back before and during the early part of the beating.) Prevalent throughout the film is Sheriff's Deputy Fred Ross, whose job now demands that he go around town carrying out evictions on families unable to pay their rent.During all of this, as the film progresses, Flint's crime rate skyrockets, with shootouts and murders becoming all too common. Crime becomes so prevalent, that when the ABC News program Nightline tries to do a live story on the plant closings, someone steals the network's van (along with the cables), abruptly stopping the broadcast. Living in Flint becomes so desperate, that Money magazine names the town as the worst place to live in America. The residents react with outrage and stage a rally where issues of the magazine are burned.At the film's climax, Moore finally confronts Smith at the chairman's annual Christmas message, addressing him from a distance (Moore claims in the DVD commentary that two security guards are restraining him to keep him from getting closer to Smith). Smith is shown expounding about generosity during the holiday season, concurrently as Sheriff Fred Ross evicts more families. After Smith's speech, Moore bird dogs Smith:Dejected by his failure to bring Smith to Flint, Moore proclaims that "as we neared the end of the 20th century", as the rich got richer and the poor got poorer, "it was truly the dawn of a new era."After the credits, the film displays the message "This film cannot be viewed within the city of Flint", followed by "All of the theaters have closed."