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Capitalism makes you want to take it to the bank

By Abby Brennan
St. Thomas Aquinas

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Michael Moore's Capitalism: A Love Story will make you want to smash up a bank.

It's a bitter, bitter movie, no doubt about that.

Moore's trademark gonzo humor has nearly disappeared, making only a few half-hearted appearances near the end.

Instead, there are haunting shots of foreclosed-on neighborhoods, harrowing stories of the destruction of ordinary people by unfeeling banks and endless statistics of bonuses and bailouts.

Particularly terrifying is his revelation that airline pilots often have to go on food stamps or work two jobs to keep flying, something implicated in many plane crashes.

It's enough to make the most diehard conservative a socialist.

Perhaps most interesting is the movie's lucid explanation of the financial collapse.

Moore chronicles smoky back-room deals, businesses legislated by their former CEOs and economists who can't explain what a derivative even is.

For the first time, I actually understood what had even happened.

This movie, like most of Moore's work, will only be seen by people who already agree with him.

Its chance of convincing the masses that, as one Catholic priest interviewed puts it, "capitalism is evil" is very slim.

Even with much of his humor gone, Moore's tendency to go for the cheap shot and the strawman argument is in full force.

But it's hard to protest when you're too busy being outraged at the bonuses given to bankers who ruined our financial system.

The otherwise grim and dark movie turns for the uplifting near the end.

Moore still holds a touching faith in the people's ability to rise up and fight their oppression.

Epic music more suited to Wolverine beating up Magneto accompanies footage of sit-ins and protests.

Moore even forgets his own point early in the movie about the current Treasury secretary's previous qualification being not regulating the banks in New York to hail Obama as an agent of major change.

Unfortunately, with the bankers still in their privileged positions at the top, Moore's optimism seems out of place.

Nevertheless, if anyone ever decides to start the revolution, I'll be by their side, singing We Shall Overcome and bringing a plate of cookies.