FemaleFirst.co.uk: DVD: Sicko [DVD] [2007]

Sicko [DVD] [2007]
enlarge	Director: Michael Moore Studio: Optimum Home Entertainment Category: DVD List Price: ~~£17.99~~ Buy New: £2.17 as of 22/11/2009 05:52 GMT details You Save: £15.82 (88%) New (15) Used (8) from £2.17 Seller: twentyfiveorless Rating: 32 reviews Sales Rank: 3740 Format: PAL Language: English (Original Language) Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over Region: 2 Number Of Discs: 1 Running Time: 118 Minutes Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3 Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.4 x 0.6 EAN: 5055201802149 ASIN: B000Z63YRU Theatrical Release Date: 2007 Release Date: January 7, 2008 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days


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Editorial Reviews: Amazon.co.uk Review Michael Moore's latest documentary may see him moving his sights away from the purely political arena, yet he loses none of his bite in the process. And with ISicko/I, a slanted, at-times devastating attack on the American health care system, he's made one of his best films. P The problem, of course, for a UK audience is that it's a very American system that Moore is attacking in ISicko/I. He's out to highlight the number of people with health insurance who are getting perfectly legitimate claims turned away, as the companies concerned get fat off the profits. But there is a British angle, as Moore presents a surprisingly idyllic take on Britain's own health service, that does sit in the midst of the film's flabby middle section. P Yet when Moore points ISicko/I at the very people the system is letting down, his skills very much come to the fore. He puts forward passionate, partisan arguments with an incendiary style that few working American documentary makes can come close to matching, and it makes ISicko/I compulsive viewing. Whether you agree with the man's politics or not, his films are provocative, very well made and hard not to admire. ISicko/I is no exception. --IJon Foster/I

Customer Reviews: Showing reviews 1-5 of 32 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next » Because he has to be... April 13, 2008 Johnny P (U.K.) 5 out of 6 found this review helpful In the reviews here, MM gets criticism for being one sided. This is a tactic that he has to employ. If he didn't, the subject matters wouldn't get the publicity, and the audiences wouldn't be motivated to ask the questions. In this field of film making, you have to be polemic, otherwise you produce yet another program for TV that will only enjoy a small audience. br /And yes, in Britain, we might grumble, but never, oh never, give up the NHS and the BBC. For when people who are dictated by profit control your health and information, you are in a very, very sorry state. Or the U.S. you'll cry 'til you laugh June 3, 2008 WHITLAM (leafy Clapham) 2 out of 2 found this review helpful Moore's films are usually described on the box as 'outrageously funny'; this one is clearly the darkest, as he deals with real people who may already have died as i write this. br /The film is, as always, extremely selective and marvellously stuck together so that, from a movie-going point of view, there is a beginning , a middle and a wonderful concluding twenty minutes. br /The knives are wielded, as they should be, at Corporate American Healthcare Firms as the victims are paraded on-screen and ultimately treated better in Cuba than they would have been at home in the USA. br /It's propagandistic, portraying the UK NHS as a paragon but,with his thesis being a cry for 'universal free healthcare' , anything is better than the situation for the 50 million US citizens who are denied free healthcare. br /If you are British or live in the UK this film will make you value your NHS a bit more; if you are American I suppose it will make you feel lucky not to be bundled out of a taxi and left at the mercy of one of the Emergency shelters. br /It needs to be stressed, finally, that this is still a hugely entertaining film. Moore's ability to get away with his vitriolic attacks on the US Government, especially its extreme right wing (!) and the way he accesses Cuba and Guantanamo Bay in the film, make you feel that there is a constructed element to this film, but it's certainly not his own fiction. br /I highly recommend this Moore film as much as the others. Michael Moore,s most focused film to date December 27, 2007 russell clarke (halifax, west yorks) 13 out of 21 found this review helpful Michael Moore polarises opinion like just about nobody else I can think of with the possible exception of George Galloway. His detractors ,namely the rich and powerful , neo cons and those stapled to the right politically plus the plain dumb and ignorant say( The plain dumb and ignorant probably don't in all fairness, after all they are ignorant and dumb. They just know the guy rubs them up the wrong way) that he misrepresents the truth , lies even just to get his political agenda across. Coming from such an opinion base this is hypocrisy of the highest order. Stop whining ...you lot do it all the time .Even if Michael Moore is bending reality sometimes, so what ,he's playing these guys at their own game and they don't like it which makes it imperative that he carry's on . They don't like the publicity stunts he pulls in his films either . I'll admit they do make me wince sometimes (The one with Charlton Heston in "Bowling For Columbine" is a case in point) but they do seem to get the point across effectively. br /The good news is Sicko doesn't rely on the gimmicky stunts very much. This is the most focused film Moore has made in that it presents facts, case studies and interviews with a calm coruscating eye and it's all the more powerful for it, After all the evidence presented here is more than enough. Sicko scrutinizes the American health care system, focusing on its for-profit health insurance and pharmaceutical industry. The film compares the non-universal and for-profit U.S. system with the universal and non-profit systems of Canada, the United Kingdom, France and Cuba. br /Moore talks to unfortunate Americans who have found themselves on the wrong end of the American health system. The film opens up with footage of a bloke stitching up a nasty cut on his own knee because he doesn't have health insurance, along we are told with fifty million other Americans. The tales related here are shocking , caustically amusing , at least in the way they are related to the audience, and profoundly upsetting at times. American Health companies employ people who dissect insurance contracts and claims just so they can figure out ways not to have to pay out ,meaning that desperately ill people are denied the treatment that can save their life's. As is evidenced by the tale of a little girl whose parents insurance company attempted to block her treatment thus delaying it and costing the girl her life. Moore interviews some of the former employees of insurance companies who give articulate testimony to the despicable lengths these multi-billion dollar corporations will go to avoid paying out. br /Moore is on slightly less solid ground when he starts to compare Americas health care to others around the world. He makes the various free at point of entry health care systems in Canada, Cuba, France and The United Kingdom seem positively wondrous utopian mantologist havens. I'm sure there are plenty of people in any of those countries who would beg to differ .Certainly the N.H.S. has it's own horror stories , indeed I have had my own awful experiences concerning that but Moore paints pictures of divine benevolent sanctuaries free from stress , pain and worry. France in particular looks to have a wonderful system that extends beyond the provision of healthcare and Moore's reaction as U.S. citizens living in France regale him with all the utilitarian marvels at their disposal is one of the films enjoyable lighter moments. br /This being a Michael Moore film there had to be a stunt but at least he makes sure it's a good one. Working out that Guantanamo Bay is the only place on American soil that offers high quality free health care to it's residents he takes a group of people who had contracted serious illnesses while working at "ground zero" on 9/11 but had fallen foul of America's health care system there to see if they can get some of this great free treatment. Needless to say that fails so he takes them on to Cuba and what he encounters is such a revelation to these people that they are reduced to alternate tears of anger at their country's failing and tears of gratitude for what the Cubans provide them with. br /A tacked on meeting between brother fire fighters feels unnecessary and rather loses the focus of the film briefly but there is no denying this is powerful ammunition against those in America who believe ,mostly because the powers that be have told them so, that subsidized socialist health care for all will be the end of civilisation as we know it. br /Perhaps the greatest warning to be taken from Sicko from , at least from a British perspective is that the American system is the way that we are heading .The N.H.S, is being privatised by stealth (Read George Monbiot on PFI,s) anyway and the undermining of the system with rapacious beaurocracy and health care horror stories are merely an insidious method way of getting the public to accept that the N.H.S. cannot work. The whole is best summed by Tony Benn who Moore interviews for this film when he says"Keeping people hopeless and pessimistic - see I think there are two ways in which people are controlled - first of all frighten people and secondly demoralize them. An educated, healthy and confident nation is harder to govern". br /A country isn't just its flag, it's state buildings ,it's anthem its the people who dwell there. Any country which doesn't look after it's people isn't much of a country at all. Sicko is a film by a man mourning the state of much of it's people and the fact that it is the country he calls home allowing this to happen .One of the richest nations on this over heating dung ball we call earth. Moore will cop the usual flak for Sicko but not only is it his finest achievement cinematically it may be the one film that truly engenders change. br /NB: As I wrote this review it was drawn to my attention that a young woman (Nataline Sarkisyan) in America had died due the prevarication of her health insurance company(They refused a liver transplant as the policy "Does not cover experimental, investigational and unproven services")her family are to take legal action with possible murder ( Or at the very least manslaughter )charges pending. The change has already started it would seem. Not before time. br / br / br / br / love him or hate him he asks the right questions April 5, 2008 Lucy H. Pearce 2 out of 3 found this review helpful yes he uses one sided arguments and clever film making and can be smug etc but thank god someone in america has the balls to ask the questions he does,has the imagination to llok outside american propaganda to the wider world, and questions the basic tenets of the american dream's effect on real working americans who are canon fodder for their own propaganda. the NHS certainly aint perfect but I ahve never heard of sick people being sent away in taxis and dropped on the street because they couldn't afford hospital treatment like he shows in the USQ- appaling some of the stuff he documents and hard to believe that a civilized country can putprofit before the well beign of its own tax paying, insurance paying citizens. His publicity stunt bits didn't sit too well with me, but that's what makes him who he is... right-whingers hate facts September 9, 2009 T. Kennedy (USA) 1 out of 1 found this review helpful ah the truth hurts. michael moore continually exposes america as a horrible corrupt place where the people and politicians are slaves to corporations. i find it sad that so many people accuse moore of being biased and a liar, but never point out where he has lied. these people are obviously also corrupt. they don't want you to watch this film because it exposes their corruption. ordinary americans, including children, die because of their system and nothing can be done because american politicians and news corporations are bribed by health insurance companies and drug companies. this documentary shows this. some people will do or say anything for money and they will do anything to cover their tracks. this film exposes these people. i am not a communist by the way. Showing reviews 1-5 of 32 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next »

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