'Fahrenheit 11/9' bombing at the box-office

"Fahrenheit 11/9" is bombing badly at the American box-office and it's not because it's a bad movie. I was pleasantly surprised by its passionate, anti-establishment discourse when I saw it earlier this month. However, opening to a little over $3 million in 1,719 theaters is bad, really bad. Moore's 2004 George W. Bush indictment, and Palme d'Or Winning, “Fahrenheit 9/11” was a product of its time, and it worked wonders at the box-office (check that $19M opening weekend) because Bush, contrary to Trump, was not as consistently covered on television. This just goes to show the grasp and hold Trump has on the American discourse, he wants consistent wall-to-wall coverage so he can manipulate the media as the puppets that they are and, guess what, he is doing just that. 

However, Moore's doc is not even all that much about Trump, it shoots darts at everybody from Hilary to Obama to Pelosi. Moore's message in the film is fascinating, he wants a complete restructuring of government, from the bottom-up. He says corruption is everywhere, even in Obama's administration, and that grassroots social activists, like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, are the future of the country. It's a surprising turn of events for a film that was billed as a Trump hate-fest. That's the problem, it was billed as a scathing indictment of Trump, promotional ads had Trump on the poster, and the trailer consisted of mostly Trump footage. People in this country did not want to see that movie, and, if they had bought a ticket, they would have been pleasantly surprised by the vastly different film that was playing on the screen.

The sad-sack opening numbers "Fahrenheit 11/9" has garnered are projecting the film to maybe make $5 million-$8 million. This means that  “Won’t You Be My Neighbor,” (22M) “RBG,” (14M) “Three Identical Strangers” (12M) and, maybe even, Dinesh D'Souza's ultra-conservative "Death of A Nation" (6M) could be ahead of Moore's doc when all is said and done. Despite all that, I believe Moore has made his best, most cohesive film since "Fahrenheit 9/11." There's something to be said about a film that doesn't mind pissing off the right, left and center of the political spectrum. Moore would rather cheer for the underdog, the minority, grassroots campaigns which are trying to be shunned off by establishment politicians. His film will likely age well over time and, hopefully, people will wake up to the actual, current situation we are currently in. Don't believe the hype, it's much more than just about Trump.