Sicko (Special Edition) | 
 enlarge | Director: Michael Moore
Actors: Michael Moore, Tucker Albrizzi, Tony Benn, George W. Bush, Reggie Cervantes
Studio: Weinstein Company
Category: DVD
List Price: $14.93
Buy Used: $2.89
You Save: $12.04 (81%)
New (51) Used (49) from $2.89
Rating:  410 reviews
Sales Rank: 1255
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Widescreen, NTSC
Languages: English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Original Language), French (Original Language), Russian (Original Language), Spanish (Original Language)
Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Region: 1
Discs: 1
Running Time: 123 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.6
MPN: WEID80750D
UPC: 796019807500
EAN: 0796019807500
ASIN: B000UNYJXQ
Theatrical Release Date: June 22, 2007
Release Date: November 6, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
| |
| |
| Similar Items:
| |
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Studio: Genius Products Inc Release Date: 05/20/2008 Rating: Pg13
Amazon.com
SiCKO is more like a controlled howl of protest than a documentary. Toning down the rhetoric of past efforts--no CEOs, congressmen, or celebrities were accosted in the making of this film--Michael Moore's latest provocation is just as heartfelt, if not more heartbreaking. As he clarifies from the outset, his subject isn't the 45 million Americans without insurance, but those whose coverage has failed to meet their needs. He starts by speaking with patients who've been denied life-saving procedures, like chemotherapy, for the most spurious of reasons. Then he travels to Canada, England, and France to see if socialized medicine is as inefficient as U.S. politicians like to claim--especially those who receive funding from pharmaceutical companies. Moore finds quality care available to all, regardless as to income. He concludes with a stunt that made headlines when he assembles a group of 9/11 rescue workers suffering from a variety of afflictions. When Moore is informed that detainees at Guantánamo Bay--technically American soil--qualify for universal coverage, he and his companions travel to Cuba to get in on that action. It's a typically grandstanding move on Moore's part. And it proves remarkably effective when these altruistic individuals, who've either been denied treatment or forced to pay outrageous costs for their medication, experience a dramatically different system. Nine years in the making, SiCKO makes a persuasive case that it's time for America to catch up with the rest of the world. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
|
| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 410
 Medicine in the US is sick August 15, 2010
Street Fighting Doc
I'm a medical insider, a physician, and I can tell you that Moore went very easy on providers in this film. He could have gone after overly competitive, anal, greedy providers (nurses, docs, physician assistants) as well, but he decided to focus on the administrative side of things. At least providers do the actual work of seeing patients, but let me assure you that there are many people, and not as many docs as you would think, pulling millions of dollars out of the medical insurance pot. So it is also in the pharmaceutical business. These are the "suits" or the business types who really don't provide much of anything, but have, smelling money as their guide, rooted their way to the money trough and into the control tower. Believe me, the last thing they care about is "quality health care." They care about making lots of money. They leave the "quality" to overly-worked health care providers as they shove the lever from "fast" to "faster" with one hand while in the other hand they hold a computer print-out stating production times and profit. "If we could only get rid of a few providers and make the others work harder....." or, if we could only reduce the time providers spend with people we could up the numbers of patients seen per day."
Moore got it right, but he didn't turn over the last rock.
A sickening wake up call for all Americans August 14, 2010
Mr. Alick G. Rogers (NSW Australia)
SiCKO is one of the best researched and presented indictments of a cruel system I have witnessed! Not only every American, but everyone who can read and write in our World today, should have access to this Film. I believe it should be shown to every School Student in the USA, for apparently, they may be the only ones who can, and will have to demand the Nationalization of their Health System! For the sake of the better Health of every American, someone in a responsible position, with backbone, should grasp the Nettle now, and help President Obama to achieve it as soon as humanly possible!
It is sickening to learn how Americans got this uncaring Health System, and how it is dispensed. It is just as sickening to have had at least one of our ex Prime Ministers (John Howard) promote and achieve our current Health System which is 60% American and 40% Nationalised (60% for profit & 40% Serviced by the Public Sector).
If the Government of USA needs a Role Model, then they need look no further than Cuba, England, France or Canada.
Ever grateful to Michael Moore for the humane manner in which he presented victims of a rotting system telling their own true stories!
Gordon Rogers
NSW Australia
 Oversimplification of a complex issue August 2, 2010
DEC (IL United States)
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
So here we are once again. Our good buddy Michael Moore is going to do what he does best: Oversimplify a complex issue.
For instance, in Sicko we learn that the Cuban system of medicine is far superior to the United States. How do we learn this? He brings some everyday Americans with him to Cuba to buy their expensive exploitive American medicines for little to no money. Wow. That Fidel Castro is such a compassionate and progressive fellow isn't he? No mention is made of course of the lousy economic and political conditions in the country. Hint: There is a reason why people risk their life boarding a piece of junk raft and make their way to Miami. If it was so wonderful to live in Cuba, people wouldn't do that. Have you ever heard of somebody boarding a wooden raft or boat to leave the United States for some other country? No, didn't think so, although I wouldn't put it past Sean Penn to do something like that.
He also takes us to Canada where he interviews our Canuck friends in a health clinic. He asks them how much money they had to shell out for their visit. Why none of course! It's free you silly goose you. What he doesn't tell you is that Canadians actually do pay for their own healthcare, they just do it in the form of higher taxes and now they also have money withheld from their checks specifically for their health insurance premiums. The system is under financial strain as you can imagine. It turns out the Canadian health care system has the same price pressures as the US system. The only difference is how the bills are paid. While it isn't true that you have to wait months for an emergency procedure as some alarmists have suggested, it is true that if you do not live in a major metropolitan area of Canada, finding adequate health care is difficult. But that is a function of the remoteness of certain locations rather than any fault with the system. Keep in mind also, Canada is a country of about 34 million people. Much smaller than the US, so a system for 34 million may not be the best solution for 300+ million.
We are treated to the usual emotional tactics that are the hallmark of all Michael Moore movies. Show people telling tear jerking stories about hardships in life, then conclude that because of that, the system needs to be changed. As usual, we do not hear all of the specifics behind these cases. We are just supposed to believe that the people are all good and the corporations are all evil and sacrifice babies in a fiery pit (ok that was an exaggeration, but the general message is clear).
Healthcare is a very complex issue. The problems cannot be evaluated or solved with appeals to emotionalism. A very serious and dedicated study must be made to find out what the issues are and how do we address them. Passing legislation to overhaul our healthcare system without doing due diligence will lead to financial disaster. The socialist medicine examples shown in this film are the product of governments trying to give the people what they want as quickly as they can for political gain, rather than trying to find the best solution to the problem which in many cases is not a quick fix. But in today's instant gratification world, it fits the bill.
So in conclusion, I wouldn't waste my money on this. I would rent this, but not buy. Then you can come to your own conclusion.
Jesus -not crusaders- would love Michael! July 8, 2010
one world
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Mr. Moore sometimes gets attacked for being a fatso socialist who doesn't really make documentaries.
In SICKO Moore leads a small film crew that shares the unravelled fate (of only a few of the 24,000) volunteered and desperate US health care victims who quickly replied to his call for attention.
Moore, as an artful dodger, sheds light on some of the the most outrageously unfair cases upon an international stage. It is this staging that provokes the outrage of staid documentary consumers who feel easily threatened by health care systems which are less driven by stock market greed.
 Mr. Paine anyone? July 2, 2010
Thomas
Michael Moore, America's living embodiment of Thomas Paine, gives us a measured, and uncommonly evenhanded look at America's health-care industry as compared to those in Canada, England, and France. Although pocked by spurts of pomposity, Sicko uses the "cruel to be kind" method of educating its viewers about the issue of universal health care in the United States. "Look at the other civilized countries," Moore says; "their systems work. When other countries make better cars, we drive them. When other countries make better wine, we drink it. So how come, when other countries have better health-care systems, we don't adopt those systems?"
Moore's plea to the American consumer is an emotional roller coaster, and that's understating things. Excluding people who have no health insurance at all, he describes the difficulties of several individuals across the country, all covered by health insurance, in receiving adequate medical attention. Heart-rending stories are told about people denied tests and procedures that would have ultimately saved their lives, as the HMOs deemed the efforts as "experimental" or the patients' status as "not life threatening." Moore includes sworn testimony (before Congress) and interviews of former or current medical reviewers, i.e., people who decide whether a claim will be rejected or accepted. It's pretty damning stuff.
But of course, it's the health-care system of other countries that are sometimes held up as the ideal to which America should aspire. But that's socialist propaganda, you say. Government-supported health care? Bah. Socialized medicine is just another way for the commies to get to us and destroy our way of life. But it turns out that's not quite the case; Canadians, for instance, pay nothing for health care and still enjoy comparatively low taxes while living longer than Americans. Oh, and they have a lower infant-mortality rate too; but then again, so does nearly every other civilized nation. Things are bad enough in the US that Moore's Canadian relatives get temporary health care before visiting him in the US, just in case something goes wrong. And some American citizens steal across the border to get themselves some of that free medical attention when they can't get it here.
Moore also examines, in a touching, gut-wrenching look, the plight of many September 11 first responders. As most people know, the air around Ground Zero in New York was dangerously bad for quite some time after the attacks. Many firefighters, EMTs, and policemen risked their lives to pull others from the wreckage. But there were also many volunteers who happened to be in the area who ran back to the flames and into the smoke to help others. These people, says the government, aren't eligible for much care related to their injuries. After having been constantly lauded as heroes for months after the attacks, many of the first responders were ignored, left to fend for themselves as their health slipped further and further. One man - a man who risked death to help strangers - has two bad lungs and must cart around a breathing apparatus to survive; he can't even sleep on his back or stomach, because he just can't breathe.
The only true instance of bombast on the part of Moore is when he takes a few of these 9/11 workers to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to receive the same level of medical treatment as the "enemy combatants" in the prison. He's denied, of course, so he traverses Havana for help and easily finds it. An inhaler that costs one of the 9/11 workers over a hundred dollar - when several are needed monthly - costs under one dollar in Cuba. Same inhaler, same medicine for a fraction of the cost.
I realize that even though this is a documentary, Moore does have an agenda to push, as he does with all of his films. But what is his motivation? Is it merely to poke fun at big, bloated insurance companies and the government? Or is it to raise awareness of a national crisis? Moore's point isn't that health care should definitively be offered to everyone for free, it's just that there are a huge number of people in America who are actually covered but can't get proper medical treatment. It's a national disgrace, Moore implies, and he's precisely right. Understandably, we often have to throw money at war machines to gain a political edge, but in doing so we tend to completely neglect the sheer humane practice of making sure everyone has the opportunity to get well.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 410
|
|
|
