Utah gets five minutes and 25 seconds in "Slacker Uprising," Michael Moore's documentary (available on a free download on the movie's web site) about his 2004 college get-out-the-vote tour - and, all in all, the state comes out looking pretty good.

About an hour into the film - at the 57:04 mark, precisely - Moore chronicles when the tour came "to visit the liberals stranded in Utah" with his infamous appearance at Utah Valley State College (what's now Utah Valley University).

We then get a fast montage of TV news coverage (all four local TV news stations - 2, 4, 5 and 13 - are included) of the buildup to Moore's visit, including local businessman Kay Anderson's $25,000 offer the student-government officials to cancel the event. (Anderson was outbid by somebody in Reno, who offered $100,000 to cancel Moore's visit at the University of Nevada-Reno.)

Then the movie shows a bit of Moore onstage, praising the UVSC student leaders for their courage. "They wouldn't back down," Moore said, "because they have the radical belief that Utah is still in the United States of America."

Moore doesn't show Roseanne Barr's less-than-stellar performance on the UVSC stage (though she is shown, briefly, at another tour stop). And no mention is made of right-wing blowhard Sean Hannity's pre-emptive visit to UVSC a few days before.

The movie ends optimistically, in spite of the fact that Moore failed in his goal of unseating George W. Bush. Moore claims that voters in 54 of the 62 cities he visited went to John Kerry - and that the college-age vote was the only demographic group that Kerry won. "Unfortunately, their parents voted for Bush," the movie adds.

Labels: politics, Utah Valley University

Michael Moore's latest documentary, "Slacker Uprising," is not playing in a theater near you. It's playing practically everywhere else - on TVs, computers, cell phones or wherever else you wish to download 1.04 gigs.

Moore made the film - which chronicles his 2004 get-out-the-vote college tour - available for a free download, as of Tuesday. On the movie's web site, Moore sent this message:

"I'm giving you my blanket permission to not only download it, but also to email it, burn it, and share it with anyone and everyone (in the U.S. and Canada only). I want you to use 'Slacker Uprising' in any way you see fit to help with the election or to do the work that you do in your community. You can show my film in your local theater, your high school classroom, your college auditorium, your church, union hall or community center. You can have your friends and neighbors over to the house for a viewing. You can broadcast it on TV, on cable access, on regular channels or on the web. It's completely free - I don't want to see a dime from this. And if you want, you can charge admission or ask for a donation if it's to raise money for a candidate, a voter drive, or for any non-profit or educational purpose. In other words - it's yours!"

Some are taking Moore up on the challenge. BYU College Democrats (yes, both of them - ha, ha) had a screening on campus Tuesday night.

The movie will be of interest for Utahns because the state is prominently featured in one segment (pictured above). Moore, as you may recall, brought his tour to Utah Valley State College (now Utah Valley University) and raised a ruckus - including the efforts of one Kay Anderson, who offered student-government officials $25,000 to cancel Moore's appearance.

I'll post a brief review of the movie here later, as soon as the sucker downloads on my iTunes account. Only five hours to go!

(UPDATE: I got an e-mail from Austin Smith, who organized the BYU screening, which was enjoyed by about 50 people. "It was kind of a depressing ending for liberals since of course Bush did get elected, but I felt the movie was a warning voice, and it definitely inspired me to try even harder to get a progressive candidate elected this November, specifically through encouraging people my age to vote," Smith wrote.)

(Photo: Brave New Films)

Labels: politics, Utah Valley University