Roger & Me (1989)
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100% of critics liked it
(27 reviews) -
77% of users liked it
(19,281 ratings)
Michael Moore's wickedly iconoclastic documentary was inspired by the decline and fall of Flint, Michigan. Once the site of a thriving General Motors plant, Flint went quickly to seed when GM decided to close down and move out. As Moore pokes around what has been described by one magazine as… More Michael Moore's wickedly iconoclastic documentary was inspired by the decline and fall of Flint, Michigan. Once the site of a thriving General Motors plant, Flint went quickly to seed when GM decided to close down and move out. As Moore pokes around what has been described by one magazine as "the worst place to live in America", he finds out how the local populace is coping with GM's betrayal of the American Dream. Among those visited are a family who is evicted just before Christmas, and an enterprising middle-aged woman who set up a thriving business slaughtering and skinning rabbits. Never feigning objectivity, Moore contrasts the impact of the shutdown on the average Joes and Janes with the diffident reaction of Flint's power elite. The latter's patronizing attitude towards the unemployed multitudes is succinctly captured in the scenes in which visiting celebrities Robert Schuller, Anita Bryant, Bobby Vinton and Pat Boone exhort the citizenry to grin and bear it. Even more out of synch is "Miss Michigan" Kaye Lani Rae Rafko, who in her morale-boosting speech to the disenfranchised GM employees begs them to pull for her in the upcoming Miss America pageant! The film's throughline is Moore's futile effort to locate GM chairman Roger Smith, so that he can show Moore first-hand the utter devastation of Flint. Roger & Me is very funny, but it is the gallows humor of soldiers about to embark on a suicide mission. In 1992, Michael Moore more or less updated Roger & Me with his half-hour short subject Pets or Meat: The Return to Flint. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Directed By
- Michael Moore, Anita Bryant
- Written By
- Michael Moore
- Genres
- Documentary, Special Interest
- In Theaters
- Jun 1, 1989 Wide
- Studio
- Warner Home Video
Critic Reviews
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Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com
Despite some tempering with the chronological sequence of events, this is a scathingly biting satire of Reagonomics that captures the zeitgeist of the late 1980s much more poignantly than most Hollywood movies.
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Alex Sandell, Juicy Cerebellum
Effective.
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Jon Niccum, Lawrence Journal-World
Entertaining but overpraised first effort from Moore
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Steve Crum, Kansas City Kansan
the first of Moore's already legendary documentaries.
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MaryAnn Johanson, Flick Filosopher
brilliant and subversive
See more critic ratings and reviews on Rotten Tomatoes
Fresh (60% or more critics rated the movie positively)
Rotten (59% or fewer critics rated the movie positively)
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Cast
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Pat Boone
as Himself
- Anita Bryant
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Connie Francis
as Herself
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Bob Eubanks
as Himself
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Michael Moore
as Himself
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Roger B. Smith
as Himself
- Ronald Reagan



