Michael Moore’s cinematic efforts couldn’t manage to vote the Republicans out of the White House in 2004, but that hasn’t stopped him from trying again. With Slacker Uprising, Moore trains his camera not on the sitting president or his party, but rather his own efforts to mobilize the youth vote in the last presidential election. Of course, there’s something strangely self-aggrandizing about Moore making a movie about his unrelenting commitment to incite America’s youngsters to political activism, but there’s always been a self-congratulatory air in Moore’s films, and at least Slacker Uprising seems to more or less acknowledge it. But while I’m not sure that celebrating the ultimately futile efforts by the Left to sway the election in its favor will serve much of a purpose this time around, it’s hard to fault Moore’s plan to make the movie available as a free download in order to get it seen by the maximum amount of interested people. Of course, it's quite possible that the movie will suck (word from Toronto last year wasn't great), much less make a difference in this year's election. But in a movie season that will also see the anti-Michael Moore spoof/jeremiad An American Carol, I’d say he’s at least entitled to a rebuttal.
