Product Details

• Actors: Michael Moore, Charlton Heston, Marilyn Manson, Salvador Allende, Jacobo Arbenz
• Directors: Michael Moore
• Writers: Michael Moore
• Producers: Charles Bishop, Charlie Siskel, Chris Aldred, Gillian Aldrich, Jeff Gibbs
• Format: PAL
• Language: German (Dolby Digital 5.1), English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
• Subtitles: German
• Region: Region 2 (Read more about DVD formats.)
• Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Run Time: 120 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1,136 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0000916TJ
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #581,039 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "Bowling for Columbine" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Michael Moore's superb documentary (following in the footsteps of Roger & Me and The Big One) tackles a meaty subject: gun control. Moore skillfully lays out arguments surrounding the issue and short-circuits them all, leaving one impossible question: why do Americans kill each other more often than people in any other democratic nation? Moore focuses his quest around the shootings at Columbine High School and the shooting of one 6-year-old by another near his own hometown of Flint, Michigan. By approaching the headquarters of K-Mart (where the Columbine shooters bought their ammo) and going to Charlton Heston's own home, Moore demands accountability from the forces that support unrestricted gun sales in the U.S. His arguments are conducted with the humor and empathy that have made Moore more than just a gadfly; he's become a genuine voice of reason in a world driven by fear and greed. --Bret Fetzer

Review

Barberland is a poignant coast-to-coast portrait of the men who cut people’s hair for a living: the all-American barber. -- Independent Feature Project (IFP), September 18, 2002

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

186 of 251 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I Did Not Want To See This Movie... November 4, 2003

By Bindy Sue Frřnkünschtein TOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:DVD

OK, I had heard so many negative things about this movie that I didn't want to bother with it. Then, my beloved brought it home. We watched it together and I completely flipped! Michael Moore is a film-making genius! His guerilla style is perfectly suited for the subject matter. Who else has even attempted to ask the question "Why so much fear and violence in america?" without finding simplistic, kneejerk answers? Moore takes us to Columbine to not only relive the tragedy, but to talk with the surviving victims. He even takes them to K Mart's HQ to confront the company's policy of selling handgun ammo (the columbine shooters purchased their bullets at the local k mart) with successful results. This is not just some propoganda film about the evils of gun ownership. Moore himself was raised with guns and still carries his NRA membership card. This movie is about Moore's quest to find out why we love to kill each other so much here in the states. Is it poverty? Nope, other countries have worse economic problems without the bloodletting. Is it violent music or video games? Uh-uh, these are endemic throughout the civilized world. Could it be the proliferation of handguns? No, Canada has millions of guns and it's big cities have the murder rates of our small towns! Is it our violent, gun-toting history? Negative, the entire planet has a bloody, violent past. Moore has the audacity to try to get to the bottom of this mess. BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE is not for the squeamish or the political zealot from either right or left. It's for folks who wonder at what we've become. It's for people like me who hate the idea of barracading themselves in their homes for fear of being slaughtered. This fear is also challenged here. Many sacred cow arguments are terminated.... Prepare to be angered, saddened, provoked, offended, and oddly entertained as only Michael Moore can do. A must own classic... Read more ›

98 of 133 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing Movie April 14, 2003

By "dalexnyc"

Format:DVD

I have taken 4 friends to see this movie. I have even seen this movie while I was in Montreal to see what the Canadian reaction would be. I must say, I was embarrassed to be an American after watching this movie. I then thought of all the things I should be doing to make this place a better place to live. In other words, this is a thought provoking movie that is truly provocative.

You will see Charles Heston wring his hands in nervousness after he says, "We don't want any more of that civil rights business going on again", or "the reason America is violent is because of all the mixed ethnicities." What an idiot.

And that is just what Michael Moore does, he shows people and the government in their natural element speaking freely, and shows us how insane they are and sound. From George Bush proclaiming that our number one priority should be defense spending when people all over the country are out of work and children are living in poverty without parent supervision, to the crackpot rednecks who are buying more "guns and ammo" because they want to protect themselves from the "evil doers." It's this candid honesty of Moore's subjects that makes us look inward to how this country gone astray. Then Moore tries to explain this with his amazing short animation movie "A Brief History of the United States of America." Although he simplifies everything, and it is truly brief, it hits home and is certainly eye opening.

Moore tries to explain the question of why America is so violent. Why we are the unique country in the world that kills people with guns on the astronomical level that the United States does. He offers a lot of options to this answer, but ultimately, he leaves the question open for the viewer to search out within him/herself for the answer and make change....

A truly great achievement and I can't wait till his next film that is due out 2 months before the election that will no doubt, open up people's eyes to the corrupt and blood thirsty administration that occupies the White House.

Bravo Mr. Moore! Bravo! Read more ›

18 of 23 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Gun control issues presented very professionally January 8, 2005

By Peggy Vincent

Format:DVD

Only in a few places does Michael Moore's Academy Award-winning documentary veer too sharply into diatribe. The incomprehensible student shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado formed the impetus for the making of this film, which is filled with unforgettable vignettes, including the following: the bank that offers a big gun to everyone who opens a new account, Charlton Heston turning his back on the photograph of the 6yo girl killed by her 1st grade classmate, the manager of K-Mart agreeing to halt the sale of guns and ammunition, and most disturbing to me, the disclosure that Canadians have more guns per household that we do in the USA, yet they have an infinitesimal rate of murder.

Go figure.

Definitely worth watching and then thinking about for a long time.

18 of 23 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A response to the viewer below July 11, 2003

By Nicholas Webb

There is no such thing as an unbiased documentary; indeed the less biased a documentary appears, then the more suspicious I am of it. Michael Moore can be insensitive, even cruel, as he most certainly is to Charlton Heston in this film, but I never doubt where he stands. I didn't get the impression that Heston "caused" Columbine, rather that Michael Moore, an NRA member, was chastising Heston for HIS insensitivity in holding NRA rallies in towns still affected by school massacres.

You make a very important point in your review: "The question should not be how did they get the guns, but why did they use them?" and indeed the story of "Bowling for Columnbine" essentially concerns Michael Moore's attempt to answer that question. He ultimately comes to the conclusion that it is NOT the easy availability of guns that drove these kids to mass murder, but the harsh, competitive, alienating nature of American life. Columbine High School is described by one of its graduates (Trey Parker) as a living nightmare of degredation, threats malaise. A little boy would not have killed a little girl, he reveals, if his mother had been there to monitor him, instead of having to work two jobs and take an hours-ling bus ride to and from work. Moore also makes great play of the fact that Columbine manufactures the missiles with which America bombs civilians in other countries without warning.

The film's principle flaw, and what has opened it to its detractors, is that Moore's centrepiece "stunts" (the Kmart protest, the Heston interview) appear to advocate gun control, when "Bowling for Columbine" isn't really about gun control at all, but an examination of the collective psychology of America.