Where To Invade Next (2015)

WHERE TO INVADE NEXT  (2015)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
    D: Michael Moore
Look out, America. Puck is back. In his latest comic broadside, Michael Moore takes aim at American exceptionalism, the notion favored by some patriotic citizens that not only are we different from every other country on earth, we're also way better, and so much smarter that we can't possibly learn anything from anybody else. So Moore, with his shaggy hair, baseball cap, oversized field jacket and a large American flag, crosses the Atlantic to single-handedly invade countries whose backward people are doing things in a way we're not. He freely admits he's cherry-picking his spots. As he puts it, "My mission is to pick the flowers, not the weeds." So he travels to Italy, where an average worker can get up to eight weeks paid vacation and lunch breaks are two hours long. To Slovenia, one of several countries where a college education is free. To France, where a school lunch resembles actual food, and what kids learn in sex ed teaches them something positive about sex. (Leave it to the French.) To Tunisia, where women demanded and got an equal rights amendment voted into the country's constitution. Moore's presence can be overbearing - he wouldn't be Michael Moore otherwise - but as always, he makes his point. It might be a utopian vision of what other nations have accomplished, but you can't help wondering how much healthier and happier we'd be if we could just do some of that stuff here. We're paying a price for our exceptionalism. We see that every day. We can do better. We've got a lot to learn.