Metascore

Generally favorable reviews - based on 39 Critics What's this?

User Score

Generally favorable reviews- based on 219 Ratings

  • Starring: Michael Moore
  • Summary: Sicko, filmmaker Michael Moore's new documentary, sets out to investigate the American healthcare system. Sticking to his tried-and true one-man approach, Moore sheds lights on the complicated medical affairs of individuals and local communities. (The Weinstein Company)
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 36 out of 39
  2. Negative: 1 out of 39
  1. Sicko will scare people, and it probably should.
  2. Reviewed by: Simon Crook
    80
    Horrifying, heart-breaking, often hilarious - Moore’s latest shock doc is a potent polemic.
  3. Ladies and gentlemen, I think we can agree on two things: The American health-care system is busted and Michael Moore is not the guy to fix it. His Sicko, an investigation and indictment of a system choking on paperwork, greed, bad policy and countervailing goals, turns out to be a fuzzy, toothless collection of anecdotes, a few stunts and a bromide-rich conclusion.
  4. 25
    The silliness of Moore's oeuvre is so self-evident that being able to spot it is not liberal or conservative, either; it's a basic intelligence test, like the ability to match square peg with square hole. His documentaries are political slapstick that could have been made by a third Farrelly brother or a fourth Stooge.

See all 39 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Negative: 16 out of 129
  1. ChrisD.
    10
    I was very surprised at this movie, it is a very effective documentary of the various health care systems of the world. Many will say that Moore is at it again, but I think he has shown (again) what a remarkable filmmaker he really is. I wept during one scene, and I never weep (maybe get teary every once in a awhile...), it was devastating to see and hear these horrible incidences happening to regular, hardworking people. You can say what you will about Michael Moore (I don't agree with some of his positions personally), but his movie has done an excellent job of exposing our country's completely broken and corrupt system of health care, and hopefully the dialog surrounding this movie will move politicians to rethink their position on universal health care. Expand
  2. Sicko is a rather difficult film to critically analyse and rate. On the one hand it is simply amazing and utterly necessary for American (and world) society. Moore beautifully portrays the problems and issues behind the situation in the U.S. health care system. The U.S. is fundamentally inhumane when it comes to health care, and whether most Americans are willing to admit that, Moore plows that point across with fierce dedication.
    On the other hand, to prove his point, he glosses over the problems that people in his case study countries - Cuba, Canada, UK, France - actually experience. With an obvious bias, Moore does not even try to show us the negative sides of the health care in the other countries. His "typical middle class French family" is not quite as typical as he might want us to believe. Or that British doctor is not necessarily a 100% representative of all British or European doctors, who most certainly do not live in $1 million houses & apartments. However, Moore does manage to bring a human aspect to the film, and give it a soul that many documentaries fail at. For that reason, and for the fact that he is addressing an issue that is in urgent need of addressing, this film does deserve quite a high rating. And, when it comes to his bias - well, documentaries are always biased. They never claim to represent the "truth" for they are always made with an intent, that cannot be fully objective. And Moore quite certainly recognises that, and just as he did with "Bowling for Columbine" and "Fahrenheit 9/11," he unrelentingly pursues his point across. Excellent documentary!
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  3. JaredC.
    7
    It was all right, wasn't the best documentary I've seen.
  4. MattA.
    4
    Let's be reasonable here people. The people giving zeros are ridiculous, but so are the people giving ten's. The guy who gave it a 3 and then backed up why gave the most intelligent post here yet. I am currently living in Japan, where there is public health care, and as others have noted, yes, it is a lot cheaper and sometimes has great benefits. However, I have heard of at least three instances since I have been here (It got here in May), where people had to wait several days or even weeks for treatment on something that should have been looked at within hours, a day or two at the latest. The quality is also suspect as there are many people who mysteriously pass away in Japanese hospitals in spite of the fact that their condition was stable. I know Moore is making a movie and so there is inevitably going to be a bias, but because it's a documentary it's not fair to only present the good of public health care and not the bad. People who just blindly believe that this is the way it is based on what Moore says, sort of the like the people that believes everything Al Gore said about global warming in his film, really should read credible journals and books on the subject. There are so many different opinions by credible professionals--why should we trust a filmmaker who clearly has an agenda? Expand

See all 129 User Reviews

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