First off, let's get one thing straight here: FahrenHYPE 9/11 is not a stand-alone film. It is necessary to have seen Fahrenheit 9/11 (which is usually not a problem). Preferably, you would want to watch Heit and Hype back-to-back, in that order. When you do, the strengths of Hype come to light and the weaknesses of Heit are brought to sharp relief.
What are the weaknesses in Heit?
- Overly sappy and emotional ("Human interest stories: they tug at the heart, and fog the mind." -- Kent Brockman). More than half of the movie is nothing more than emotion, which is inherently irrational (and so can't be debunked), but also is inherently impossible to show for large groups, and so is meaningless here.
- Interviews on other subjects were purchased and spliced together deceptively. Many scenes are clearly archival footage taken out of context, or just plain pointless (what does Wolfowitz's comb tell us about 9/11?).
- Weak connections were made in what is oh-so-obviously nothing more than a common conspiracy theory.
- There were a lot of people who have no better reason to know what was going on than you or I.
What are the strengths of Hype?
- Excepting the last 10 or 20 minutes there was little to no sap, and what emotion existed was placed inside well constructed arguments.
- Many people interviewed in Heit were given a chance in Hype to speak their minds not only on politics, but on Moore's film.
- Major instances of outright deceit in Heit were debunked (to the extent one would expect in a documentary).
- The film has an impressive cast compared to the unidentified elderly bingo players and working class military mom interviewed in Heit (senator Zell Miller, former mayor of NY Ed Koch, political commentator Ann Coulter, former Asst. Secretary of Defense David Frum, and the former adviser to Bill Clinton Dick Morris--of whom Time magazine had some very nice things to say--among others).
- The people in Hype were not all of one political mindset: the teacher who was with Bush on 9/11 clearly was no fan of his; Zell Miller, despite a recent departure from party lines, is a Democrat and has stated that he has no desire to change; and Dick Morris' power reached a zenith under Clinton.
Hype is not a tit-for-tat debunking of Heit--though it never tries to be, and can't be, for time constraints. It points out just a few of "The 59 Deceits of Fahrenheit 9/11" and lists several places to go for more information (I just quoted the title of one of them). What documentary on the Discovery Channel gives you that?
In that regard, FahrenHYPE 9/11 is one of the most morally well-made and usefully layered documentaries I have ever seen--if you just want to know whether or not to trust Moore, you can get that, but if you want proof and detail it'll tell you where to find it.
The tone of Hype is quite interesting, as it is more conversational and less lecture than one would expect from most documentaries. It's like you're sitting and talking with these people over coffee (incidentally, Dick Morris does have a coffee cup in some of his segments). In a casual debate with friends, you don't press them to cite their source right then, nor do you stop them from interjecting what they view as common sense into the conversation (despite how that's more opinion than fact). Sometimes they even get angry and forceful, but if your friends are worth debating at all they still make arguments that get you somewhere.
That's what Hype occupies most of its time doing. It's not a straight debunking, they're attacking the concepts underlying the first film. In that regard, Hype tears Heit to shreds.
In the end, I think, if you're going to watch one you must watch the other--but never forget to periodically take a step back and think, "Does what I'm seeing make a rational argument or present a fact that seems reasonable, or is it just plucking the heartstrings, or is it just filler?"
