Toronto. Captain Mike Across America.

"It seems that [Michael] Moore has finally made a 102-minute commercial for himself, which possibly has been his dream all along," writes Salon's Stephanie Zacharek.

"One could easily carve an interesting hour-long docu out of Captain Mike Across America, Michael Moore's ungainly account of his 'Slacker Uprising' campaign to encourage young people to vote for John Kerry - and, more importantly, against George W Bush - during the 2004 US presidential election," writes Joe Leydon in Variety. "In its current form, however, this repetitious and self-indulgent hodgepodge comes across as a nostalgia-drenched vanity project, with far too much footage of various celebs at assorted gatherings introing Moore as the greatest thing since sliced bread."

Updated through 9/14.

"Captain Mike, which played to two packed houses of Toronto Mooreomaniacs, mixes the forms of a rock-concert movie (with reaction shots of adoring fans, including one woman holding a 'Hug me, Michael' sign) and Triumph of the Will (the star lands in a city, meets the locals, attends a rally with guest speakers, then wows the crowd himself)," writes Time's Richard Corliss.

"For those who remain highly agitated by the results of the 2004 election, this picture, its upbeat 'we gotta keep fighting' coda notwithstanding, might play as a particularly unpleasant bout of scab-picking (hey, there's an alternate title for ya)," suggests Premiere's Glenn Kenny.

This is "easily Moore's weakest film, a self-congratulatory mess that has nothing to say about the American political process and tells you everything you need to know about the numbing cult of personality that's sprung up around Moore," writes Cinematical's James Rocchi.

"Why did Moore feel that this material needed to be so tediously regurgitated?" asks Ben Kenigsberg at Time Out Chicago. "Rather than inspiring his audience to action, Captain Mike does little other than call attention to the arrogance of the man who made it."

"The single largest-scale vanity project since Caligula," says the Reeler's ST VanAirsdale.

Update, 9/14: In the Guardian, Rory Carroll looks into Moore's claims in Sicko for the superiority of Cuba's health care system.

Posted by dwhudson at September 12, 2007 6:31 AM