
Here at the
Traverse City Film Festival, host Michael Moore serves up plenty of the politically-engaged docs you'd expect from him. The section called "Dangerous Docs" includes
9 Star Hotel on Palestinian workers,
Maxed Out on rapacious credit lenders and
Our Daily Bread on mechanized agriculture. But those fiberous dishes are balanced with a good helping of dessert. For four nights, in an outdoor field near the bay, the festival presents a crowd-pleaser - from
E.T. to
North by Northwest - projected on a 65-foot inflatable screen for audiences estimated at 7,000 to 10,000. Last night the offering was
Grease, introduced by Moore himself.
For this viewer, coming off a rigorous diet of
weighty docs, the combination of fresh air and pop pleasure was as restorative as a trip to the spa.
Below is a shot of the screen just before nightfall; above the movie in action.