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Clip used in 'Fahrenheit 9/11' upsets local TV station
Mlive ^ | 6/29/04

Posted on 06/29/2004 11:06:31 AM PDT by areafiftyone

While an appearance by a local TV reporter in the controversial film "Fahrenheit 9/11" has yielded shouts of recognition among local movie-goers, it's less delightful for managers at WNEM TV-5.

"All I can tell you is we're totally surprised that clips from our local newscast were used," said Ian Rubin, news director for WNEM, the CBS affiliate based in Saginaw.

"We're looking into it right now as a potential copyright violation," Rubin said.

The Michael Moore movie, an indictment of President Bush's leadership and his decision to go to war in Iraq after the 2001 terrorist attacks, took in $23.9 million to become the first documentary to debut as Hollywood's top weekend film.

About one minute of the film features footage of TV-5 reporter Dave Bondy interviewing Frances and Mel Stroik of Thomas Township about their fear of a terrorist attack in mid-Michigan.

The local clip airs during a segment focusing on what filmmaker Moore purports were attempts by the president and other officials to instill fear in Americans after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Bondy interviewed the Stroiks while they were Christmas shopping in 2001 at Saginaw Township's Green Acres Plaza.

Frances Stroik told Bondy that living near what she suggested are potential terrorist-target cities - Midland, Flint and Detroit - made her nervous.

"You never know where they're going to hit," Mel Stroik added.

Rubin said calls began pouring into the station and to Bondy after the film opened on Friday evening.

"I haven't seen the movie," Rubin said. "But anything can be taken out of context."

The Stroiks, meanwhile, are supportive of Moore's efforts, though they haven't seen the movie yet, either.

"He's doing what he believes in," said Frances Stroik, 62, of Moore. "You can't fault a guy for that."

Theater owners in cities large and small reported sellout crowds over the weekend.

The movie opened Friday in Saginaw and Midland, and will open Wednesday at the Hampton 6 in Hampton Township.

"This was a very, very tricky film," said Todd Cottrell, Hampton 6 theater manager. "When they opened it up, it was a very limited release to a small number of theaters. But with the overwhelming popularity," more prints have been pressed and distributed, Cottrell said.

Cottrell said he looks forward to seeing the film - and apparently, so do dozens of theater patrons, who've called and e-mailed the theater to complain about it not being shown here.

Showtimes are 11:10 a.m., 1:40 p.m., 4:20 p.m., 6:40 p.m. and 9 p.m.

Flint resident Lila Lipscomb, who is prominently featured in "Fahrenheit 9/11," has seen the movie three times, and plans to see it again.

Moore focuses on Lipscomb's reaction to the death of her son, Army Sgt. Michael Pedersen, 26, who was killed while fighting in Iraq on April 2, 2003.

Lipscomb, 50, is shown putting up her American flag, crying as she reads the last letter her son sent home to the family and visiting the White House lawn, where she pours out her angst and sorrow over her son's death.

"I feel so blessed to be able to have my gut-wrenching feelings be able to touch so many people," she said. "Literally, people are calling my home and giving me messages. Men - men - are telling me how when they left the movie, they were just sobbing." <


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: fahrenheit911
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To: Lokibob

Property is theft, man. Koombayah.


21 posted on 06/29/2004 11:21:29 AM PDT by Huck (Be nice to chubby rodents. You know, woodchucks, guinea pigs, beavers, marmots, porcupines...)
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To: Lokibob

"Turn it off! Turn it off!"


22 posted on 06/29/2004 11:22:50 AM PDT by rabidralph (My pit bull drives an SUV.)
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To: Lokibob
"MM needs to be sued under the copyright law and some of the profits taken away."

NO! What Michael Moore needs is a trip to Iraq and dropped off in the middle of Fallujah

23 posted on 06/29/2004 11:23:05 AM PDT by MJY1288 (Our Troops swear to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, LOOKOUT DEMS)
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To: areafiftyone

Lipscomb, right, join the cheer of the crowd for Harvey Weinstein, co-founder of Miramax Films to join them, as they arrive for the preview of his documentary, "Fahrenheit 9/11," in the nation's capital Wednesday night, June 23, 2004. Lipscomb lost her son in Iraq.

Michael Moore, left, with his wife Kathleen Glynn, center, and Lila Lipscomb, right, is greeted by Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAulife.

Lila Lipscomb used to hate antiwar protesters.

This summer, though, she is likely to be embraced by them, thanks to the key roles she and her late son -- who died serving in with the Army in Iraq -- play in Michael Moore's new movie.

Lipscomb, 49, is the latest ordinary person from Michigan plucked by Moore to star in one of his films. His documentary "Farenheit 9/11" is a scathing attack on President George W. Bush and the war against terrorism....

Lipscomb is onscreen for 20 minutes of the 110-minute film. She recounts the death of her 26-year-old son, Sgt. Michael Pedersen, a crew chief on a Black Hawk helicopter that crashed in Iraq on April 2, 2003. She talks about her grief, her evolving views on war and her disdain for Bush.

In the movie, she stands in front of the White House, declaring, "I finally have a place to put all my pain and anger."

She also reads her son's last letter, in which he describes his own rage at Bush and his questions about U.S. policy.

"He got us out here for nothing whatsoever. I am so furious right now, Mama," the letter says.

24 posted on 06/29/2004 11:25:14 AM PDT by kcvl
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To: areafiftyone

I hope cholesterol deposits are collecting rapidly on the artery walls of this fat slob's commy lovin bleedin heart. I hope these folks sue the hell out of him first though!


25 posted on 06/29/2004 11:25:18 AM PDT by ChinaThreat
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To: areafiftyone
Men - men - are telling me how when they left the movie, they were just sobbing."

As Glenn Beck alluded to, this film is the "Anti-Passion." These two films, the people that go see them, and the reactions to them are the very essence of the Culture War.
26 posted on 06/29/2004 11:26:05 AM PDT by Antoninus (Federal Marriage Amendment, NOW!)
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To: areafiftyone
Flint resident Lila Lipscomb, who is prominently featured in "Fahrenheit 9/11," has seen the movie three times, and plans to see it again.

Moore focuses on Lipscomb's reaction to the death of her son, Army Sgt. Michael Pedersen, 26, who was killed while fighting in Iraq on April 2, 2003.

Lipscomb, 50, is shown putting up her American flag, crying as she reads the last letter her son sent home to the family and visiting the White House lawn, where she pours out her angst and sorrow over her son's death.

And she wants to watch this over and over?

27 posted on 06/29/2004 11:27:00 AM PDT by Dolphy
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To: Ciexyz
A student here mentioned that he saw a good turnout in a town that has a fair amount of military families in it and that it was hopeful. Without asking him how he would know if people attending were in the military, I did ask him what he was getting at, he said that if there were military people, then they aren't as dumb as he thought. Controlling myself, I pointed out that most of the military was and is highly educated, but I was dismissed, as he went on to say that when these people get out, they are going to be working for people like him (he's 20) so he had every right to be concerned about their education level and skills.
28 posted on 06/29/2004 11:28:39 AM PDT by Tacos
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To: Tacos

if there were military people = if THEY were military people


29 posted on 06/29/2004 11:30:16 AM PDT by Tacos
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To: areafiftyone
Her name is Lila Lipscomb, and he finds her in Flint, Michigan, the home town to which he obsessively returns—Flint, the former industrial paradise destroyed by General Motors, whose emblematic decision in the eighties to close many of its plants in the city arrived like a Biblical curse. Years have gone by since the ruination, and Lila Lipscomb is still in there fighting—she works at a non-profit agency, helping the unemployed. Lipscomb, who is white, is married to an African-American, and the couple have several children, two of whom have served in the armed forces. A conservative Democrat who used to hate antiwar protesters, she describes her family as part of the “backbone” of the country. She’s not an intellectual or analytical person, but she knows who she is and what she wants to say.

All this is established in two initial interviews. Then the unimaginable happens: one of Lila’s sons, Sergeant Michael Pedersen, dies in the Iraq war. And, as we find out in a letter from Pedersen that Lila reads to her family, he died without knowing what in the world he was doing in the desert. At which point, Lila gives way to unappeasable grief. Dazed and untethered, she makes a pilgrimage to the White House. In a way, she becomes a more authentic version of Michael Moore, who is always seeking to confront power. In Washington, Moore and his crew follow her around; we can guess that he urged her along, and, sure enough, some skeptical woman—a stranger—rushes into the frame and says, “This is all staged.” Lila’s response to the intruder is devastating; it goes beyond eloquence. And at last, in the street, she loses her strength, unable to move. Why my son? As everyone who’s been through the experience says, nothing can console a parent for the death of a child. And when death is robbed of meaning, and tinged with betrayal, the pain flows over the lip of ordinary grief and engulfs us all.

“Fahrenheit 9/11” has a kind of necessary shock value: it reveals the underside of the war, the bloody messes not shown on news broadcasts. Moore makes use of footage given to him by American and foreign cameramen—scenes of Americans who were blown apart near Baghdad, or of maimed and nerve-shattered men trying to put their lives back together in a Washington hospital or at their home base. One soldier achieves a memorable clarity as he says, fighting pain and incapacity, that he’s disgusted by the lying way the Republican Party conducts its business. However embroiled the movie becomes in the upcoming election, no attack can lessen the impact of these scenes or diminish the anger they create in the audience; Moore, for once, offers experience rather than attitudes, sharp immediate suffering rather than his usual exasperated nostalgia for, say, the good old days, when the unions were strong and the workingman was king.

30 posted on 06/29/2004 11:30:31 AM PDT by kcvl
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To: areafiftyone
The author of Fahrenheit 451 was on TV last night asking for Moore to return his title to him. He said he had tried to contact Moore but Moore would never return his calls.

He stated that his bood was not political and felt that Moore's political use of the title was not in keeping with his book's meaning.

31 posted on 06/29/2004 11:30:31 AM PDT by cinFLA
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To: cinFLA

Ray Bradbury?


32 posted on 06/29/2004 11:32:45 AM PDT by Tacos
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To: areafiftyone
"Showtimes are 11:10 a.m., 1:40 p.m., 4:20 p.m., 6:40 p.m. and 9 p.m."

When's the last time you saw an article about a film - let alone even a review - include show times?

33 posted on 06/29/2004 11:32:58 AM PDT by SW6906
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To: LetsRok

"What were the opening weekend numbers for "The Blair Witch Project"? If "F9/11" is a "documentary", then so is "The Blair Witch Project"."

Forget "The Blair Witch Project." What about "The Passion of the Christ?" Seems to me that's more of a "documentary" than Moore's tripe.


34 posted on 06/29/2004 11:33:39 AM PDT by Aunt Polgara
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To: areafiftyone

That's the spirit. Everyone sue him for something. Jay-walking tickets. Whatever. The ends justifies the means. (And I'm serious - not being sarcastic.)


35 posted on 06/29/2004 11:36:58 AM PDT by plain talk
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To: LetsRok

Filmmaker Michael Moore talks with Lila Lipscomb, whose son died serving in the Army in Iraq.

On the eve of Memorial Day, Lipscomb, an office assistant who describes herself as a private person, is bracing for the release of "Farenheit," likely this summer, when she will come to the attention of millions of people.

In an interview this week, Lipscomb said her son apologized for his feelings about Bush.

"I raised my children to respect the position of the president of the United States," Lipscombsaid. "But my son was angry. He had a right to be angry."

Lipscomb last saw Pedersen at Christmas 2002, when he was headed to Iraq.

"He shared with me that he was scared but that he knew he had to go because he had committed to doing a job and he was committed to his unit," Lipscomb said, wiping tears from her face. "We both discussed our feelings. We were against it.

"I just ache. I ache. I asked God, 'Why my son?' And he answered, 'Why not?' I just want to understand why he had to be there in the first place."

In January, she received a call from Moore's company after staffers read a magazine article that mentioned Pedersen's death. She met Moore, a Davison native who spends part of the year in Michigan, and his crew at her house.

Earlier this month, Lipscomb saw the film at a private screening in New York.

"The movie was an awesome experience," Lipscomb said. "I believe in the truth. I see Michael Moore as a visionary and a patriot. He believes in the truth."

Lipscomb said Moore asked her after the screening whether she wanted anything removed from the film. Instead, she hugged him.

"I loved every minute of it," she said. "I can't wait for everyone to see it."

The movie gives Lipscomb something most grieving mothers never get: A chance to tell the world about her dead son.

Chanel Pedersen(Michael's wife), who is not in the movie and has not seen it, isn't in contact with Lipscomb. She is not likely to be a fan of "Farenheit" and Lila Lipscomb's views.

"We have creative differences and different beliefs," Chanel Pedersen said. "Hating President Bush is not going to bring Michael back."

36 posted on 06/29/2004 11:37:09 AM PDT by kcvl
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To: areafiftyone

A few months before he was sent to the Gulf, Sgt. Michael Pedersen, 26, separated from his wife but promised to talk about reconciling when he got back.

Pedersen, a crew chief, never got the chance. “It was like a chapter unfinished,” his wife, Chanel Pedersen, told The Atlanta Journal and Constitution.

Natives of Flint, Mich., Michael and Chanel started dating when she was 13 and he 15. They attended the same high school in Flint, and he joined the Army immediately after graduation.

The Pedersons, who were married in 1997, had a daughter, Destiny, 7.

Chanel Pedersen said her husband was a “quiet person.”

“He was a great father — he loved his daughter,” she said. “He was an excellent soldier.”

After she learned of his death, Chanel Pedersen had her arm tattooed. It reads, “RIP Michael.”

37 posted on 06/29/2004 11:42:16 AM PDT by kcvl
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To: areafiftyone
I find it odd that Bush-haters were persuaded by Bush (in their words "Bush's lies") that we should fight against terrorism, but were completely unaffected by the events of 9-11-01. Now they feel cheated and lied to because they were fooled by him. His words, his lies, were the reason they initially supported the decision to oppose terrorism. Now that they know he lied, there's no reason to oppose terrorism. If they are so quick to believe that he lied, how are we supposed to believe that they ever believed him in the first place? Or that they ever even heard what he actually said? Am I to believe that parents would encourage their kids to join the military to fight against terrorism because they trusted and believed Bush when he said it was necessary, but now that he's been proven right they're convinced he lied? Does not compute.
38 posted on 06/29/2004 11:48:31 AM PDT by BykrBayb (5 minutes of prayer for Terri, every day at 11 am EDT, until she's safe. http://www.terrisfight.org)
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To: Antoninus

excellent point! I hadnt heard Glenn say that, but it is perfect.


39 posted on 06/29/2004 11:59:38 AM PDT by CharlieOK1 (Funny how Vietnam vets are 'baby killers' and pro-aborts are 'defenders of women')
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To: areafiftyone
"Literally, people are calling my home and giving me messages. Men - men - are telling me how when they left the movie, they were just sobbing."

Well, then I seriously doubt they were Men. Males, maybe, in the biological sense, but certainly not Men.

40 posted on 06/29/2004 12:05:00 PM PDT by Chad Fairbanks (This Tagline Left Blank Because Protagoras is a Whiney Crybaby.)
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