Political activist/antagonist, Michael Moore (also author of 'Stupid White Men') takes a 'bemused and bitter' look at the gun laws in the US. The title springs from two fatal shootings in the town of Columbine: the first and most notorious being the mass shooting of pupils at Columbine High by two of its pupils in 1999; and the second being another fatal shooting two years later at the bowling alley of the town (which the two students had attended before they went on their killing spree in 1999). Hence the title. Moore confronts supermarket chains, the media and even pro-gun lobbyist and actor Charlton Heston (as President of the National Rifle Association). An Oscar-winning documentary based around a 1999 massacre at an American High School in Colorado, Bowling for Columbine is filmmaker Michael Moore's take on the culture of firearms violence that is, apparently, peculiar to the USA. Significantly, this is no detective investigation into the psychology and motives of the two students who randomly opened fire on their classmates, killing 12 of them--Moore regards such particulars as practically irrelevant--rather, it's an attempt to counter the moral panic and right-wing diagnoses that followed the massacre, with the likes of rock star Marilyn Manson blamed by some. Using a mixture of roving interviews, statistics, historical documentary footage, cartoon animation and the set-ups familiar to fans of his TV Nation series, Moore teases out appalling truths about gun proliferation in America. He's able to obtain a rifle by opening a bank account and shows that the bullets used in the Columbine massacre were still available at KMart--until he confronts their management with victims of the shootings. But it's not just gun proliferation that's the problem. Canada, Moore discovers, is similarly rife with firearms yet has a far lower murder rate. The problem with the US, Moore believes, is an irrational climate of fear that has driven the country to reactionary extremes since the days of the pioneers, persuading citizens that they need to be armed to the teeth. In a film short on lowlights, the highlight is Moore's confrontation with NRA President Charlton Heston. Moore's deceptively genial, shambling, regular American dude appearance (as well as his NRA membership) wins Heston's confidence and Moore teases from the actor an inadvertently racist slip of the tongue, before turning up the heat, at which point Heston terminates the interview. In this moment, the sort of anger Moore demonstrated at the 2003 Academy Awards ceremony surfaces briefly as he brandishes a picture of a gunshot victim to the retreating Heston. Funny, shrewd, righteous, hard to deny, Bowling for Columbine is uncomfortable and irresistible filmmaking. --David Stubbs From the Back Cover With his trademark charm and biting wit, award-winning filmmaker Michael Moore sets off on a rollicking journey to the heart of America, hoping to discover why the American pursuit of happiness is so riddled with mass violence. From the recorded tapes from the security cameras in the cafeteria in the morning of the massacre at Columbine High to the seriously injured Columbine students who take on the major corporation which sold the bullets that are now imbedded in their spines, to the Beverly Hills home of Charlton Heston, heart of the National Rifle Association. Moore boldly asks a question that post September 11, no other American dare ask: "Are we a nation of gun nuts ? or are we just nuts?" For Americans, it is a damningly funny indictment of a culture of fear that is armed to the teeth and running amuck. For everyone else, it is a humourous warning about what could happen to any country that chooses the American Way of creating a massive permanent underclass that must be fought off with a constitutionally-protected Uzi.