Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, July 25, 1994 TAG: 9407280049
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Tom Shales
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
Gee, that sounds like ``Dateline NBC.''
Moore is the filmmaker who in 1989 directed and starred in ``Roger & Me,'' an antic indictment of General Motors for the way it abandoned Moore's hometown of Flint, Mich. Unfortunately, as critic Pauline Kael astutely noted, the film seemed as cruel to the working-class people Moore encountered as it did to the captains of industry he was harassing.
In ``TV Nation,'' which airs Tuesday nights at 8 on WSLS-Channel 10 this summer, Moore is up to his old trick, using people as stooges and props, seemingly most pleased with himself when they look most foolish. David Letterman might be accused of doing this too, but Letterman maintains a healthy sense of his own ridiculousness. Moore assumes a posture of moral superiority.
On last week's premiere of the show, Moore attempted to spoof the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) by announcing he was moving the show south of the border, where labor is cheaper. In Reynosa, Mexico, he stopped at a General Electric plant, perhaps hoping to be chased away (as Letterman was in a famous encounter at GE headquarters in New York) but was generally ignored.
NAFTA is nothing but an opportunity for American companies to exploit Mexican workers, Moore alleged, aiming his cameras at a squalid town where workers live and at a handsome community across the border where the American managers live. ``Roger & Me'' kept coming up because Moore kept mentioning it. He can't seem to believe there are people who've heard of neither it nor him.
In New York City, reporter Rusty Cundieff anchored a segment that showed how cabdrivers sometimes ignore blacks trying to hail a taxi. Yaphet Kotto, the famous actor, was repeatedly bypassed by cabs which stopped a few feet later for Louis Bruno, identified as ``a convicted white felon'' with a long prison record.
Although all the cabs shown passed Kotto by, it was later admitted that ``some did stop ... but more than half passed him by.'' At least this story had a good point to make and made it fairly well.
Correspondent (and former Letterman writer) Merrill Markoe journeyed to Appleton, Minn., to make fun of the Prairie Correctional Facility, a prison built as a way of beefing up the hard-hit local economy. Markoe pointed out over and over that the prison was empty with nary an inmate in sight, and this was mercilessly ridiculed.
We did our own checking, however. Charles Buchholz, warden of the prison, said from Appleton that there are now 249 inmates in Prairie (capacity 516) and that the first prisoners started arriving more than a year ago, in April of 1993.
It turns out that much of the first edition of ``TV Nation'' was from a tattered old pilot taped in the winter of 1992. The show had been sitting around NBC for all those months while the network tried to figure out what to do with it. The Appleton segment was aired even though completely out of date.
Later in the same program, real estate agents and civic leaders were ridiculed for trying to promote the sale of homes near Love Canal, infamous site of toxic waste pollution in New York state. Michael Moore loves to wallow in American failures.
Based on the poor ratings it earned on its premiere, ``TV Nation'' looks like a wallowable failure itself. The program came in third behind reruns of ``Rescue 911'' on CBS and ``Full House'' and ``Sister, Sister'' on ABC. Few viewers appear to have an appetite for Moore's brand of whimsical cynicism.
``TV Nation,'' which looks as though it should be on PBS if it's going to be anywhere, was, say the credits, co-written by Michael Moore, directed by Michael Moore, executive-produced by Michael Moore, created by Michael Moore and features Michael Moore. ``Hello, I'm Michael Moore,'' he says.
Talk about belaboring the odious.
Washington Post Writers Group
by CNB