Capitalism: A Love Story

Michael Moore's opens with a bank robbery accompanied by the sound of "Louie Louie" by Richard Berry. The message is clear: 21st-century capitalism's motto is "Take what you can and let the rest be damned." The director of , , and sugarcoats his message like the consummate entertainer he is. He alternates the distressing situations of employees with the hilarious but also deeply depressing self-serving greed in politics and business. In the past year, banks have received billions of dollars in federal rescue money, but they still paid out billions in bonuses. And then they refused to lend money to companies that ended up having to fire their employees. People who have owned their homes for as long as 20 years are being foreclosed upon because those same banks sold them extremely unfavorable and complex financial products. It gradually becomes clear that there is no need for Moore to use humor to get his message across, because evidence of capitalism's destructive force is all around. According to priests and bishops, it has become an antisocial and anti-Christian system, notes Moore. This is an amusing and gripping look at an economic and political system that Moore sees as having lost all sense of humanity.