Bowling for Columbine : Reviews & Acclaim : Articles & Press

September 10, 2002
Toronto film festival heats up as fire empties theater
By Chris Vognar

TORONTO - One of the best things about the Toronto International Film Festival is the urban setting: Unlike Sundance, which unspools in a snowy Utah ski village, the TIFF is sewn into the fabric of a world-class city. So you get such sights as Willem Dafoe running across the street to beat a yellow light. Or a massive Christian pride parade with several flatbed trucks with live bands and colorfully clad dancers stopping all traffic on the main drag of Bloor Street. But nothing says spontaneity like a little fire in the movie theater. That's what happened Friday at the Cumberland, where multiple screenings were in progress. The alarms sounded as the promising Argentinian film "El Bonaerense" was just kicking into gear, and the world premiere of Iceland's "The Sea" was about halfway through. (Geez, you fly over from Iceland to show your film to the world and the evening goes up in smoke.)

The Cumberland was evacuated, as was the Famous Players screening room across the alley where press and industry folks watching Michael Moore's gun-violence doc, "Bowling for Columbine," thought the alarms were part of the film. They had good reason to wonder: The fire bells went off during a part that recounts that horrific day at Columbine High.

Turns out it was just a small fire (though you could smell the smoke on the way down the stairs). But you still had a couple of hundred people milling about on Cumberland Street, among them Baltasar Kormakur, who looked like a rock star but was actually the poor director of "The Sea." Not one to let the moment dampen his spirits, he walked to the middle of the street and took a bow moments before the firetrucks arrived, drawing scattered applause and much laughter.

Moore's film probably won't make him any new friends in the National Rifle Association, even if he is a card-carrying (though rather inactive) member. But people up here in Canada should appreciate his views on their peaceable country as expressed in "Bowling for Columbine."

Looking to figure out why America perpetually towers above the competition in the gun-related-homicide category, the portly rabble-rouser ventured to a number of Canadian cities including Toronto to see if perhaps our neighbors to the North don't believe in firearms. But he found out that Canadians actually have plenty of guns tucked away at home. They just don't seem to be into blowing each other away.

In an interview, Moore is happy to point out that Texas is the jewel in America's gun-totin' crown, accounting for more gun purchases than any other state. Needless to say, he won't be going Lone Star any time soon.

"I dread going to Texas," he says, recounting a hot, humid journey he once made to Arlington to see his beloved Detroit Tigers. "How can people stand the heat out there? I've asked them not to put Texas on the (publicity) tour for this film."

At least Moore doesn't hate all of us: He describes Austin as an oasis, recalling that the city delivered the second-largest crowd in the country on
his last book tour.

So the capital gets a pass, even though the city uses plenty of air conditioning.

"Air conditioning allowed the South to become a powerful and vital force," he says, paraphrasing from his book "Stupid White Men." "Now, they can sit in air-conditioned offices in Dallas and ... (mess) the world up."

Y'all come back now, hear?

previous | next

Comments? Questions? Go to: http://www.michaelmoore.com

Site Created by Plank • Site Hosted by Webcore Labs