Michael Moore and the Rhetoric of Documentary by Snee Brian J. Benson Thomas W

Author:Snee, Brian J.,Benson, Thomas W.
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780809334087
Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press

Public Reconciliation at the White House

But the conversion of Lila Lipscomb is not yet complete. What remains within the conventions of the narrative is to reveal the reborn figure as an icon of change and transformation and, in the process, to depict the mythic and iconic results of the conversion.

Lipscomb’s last scene is introduced by Moore’s voice-over off-camera: “Lila had called to tell me that she was coming down from Flint to Washington, DC, to attend a jobs conference. On her break, she said she was going to go and pay a visit to the White House” (123). A hand-held camera picks up Lipscomb pausing in front of a makeshift booth in which a young protester is displaying photos of presumed American atrocities. The camera catches Lipscomb and the protester talking past one another, Lipscomb telling about her son being killed in Iraq, the young protester bashing Bush. As the camera records this strange nondialogue, an unidentified woman wearing a fashionable red coat and designer sunglasses comes into the frame to see what might be going on. To the protester’s “Bush is a terrorist,” she jumps in with, “No he isn’t. This is all staged. This is all staged” (124).

Lipscomb turns on the woman, telling her what happened to her son: “He was killed in Karbala. April 2. It’s not a stage. My son is dead.” To which the woman responds, “Well, a lot of other people, too. Blame al Qaeda!” At this, Lipscomb, now visibly upset, turns away and heads off toward the White House. “What did that woman yell at you?” Moore asks off-camera. Crying now, and having trouble catching her breath, Lipscomb says, “That I’m supposed to blame the al Qaeda. The al Qaeda didn’t make a decision to send my son to Iraq. Ignorance . . . that we deal with . . . with everyday people. ’Cause they don’t know. People think they know, but you don’t know. I thought I knew, but I didn’t know” (125).

As Lipscomb makes her way toward the White House, the camera backs off, leaving us with a chilling shot from behind Lipscomb as she sobs in front of the fence before the White House. In the background, we see the Washington Monument looming up on the left, a billowing Old Glory on the right, and if we look closely, two armed personnel, either military or White House security, walking across the roof.

As we watch, Lipscomb bends over, apparently overcome with grief. Then she rights herself and says, with her back still to the camera, “I need my son. God, it’s tougher than I thought it was gonna be to be here, but it’s freeing also, because I finally have a place to put all my pain and all my anger and to release it” (125). Once ignorant, now wise, once blind, now enlightened, Lila Lipscomb emerges as a model for protest and political action. Insofar as she has demonstrated the conversion from “conservative,” “supporter of the war,” to doubter,

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