Filmmaker Michael Moore (of Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11 fame) has been keeping a low profile while working on his next feature film, entitled Sicko. Slated for a late summer release, Sicko is a portrayal of the American healthcare system, although reports have not been definitive as to what aspect Moore specifically intends to cover. One entertainment news source reports that the film is about corruption in the pharmaceutical industry, while the Internet Movie Database (IMDB.com) reports that it is about America's system of mental health care. It could be a combination of the two, or neither. Moore's website makes no mention of the project.

If about pharma, expect Moore to get some mileage out of the false notion that drug makers are immoral for promoting and profiting from the cures that they invent. This plays to the youthful activist crowd particularly well: 20 year-olds who do not suffer heartburn, high cholesterol, arthritis, or erectile dysfunction, and who do not remember the days when such conditions had no treatment, are easy to fool. Being anti-pharma is, coincidentally, a relatively new thing. In today's Wall Street Journal, journalist Scott Hensley interviewed recently-retired AstraZeneca CEO Tom McKillop, who touched upon this point:

"When I joined the industry, you went to the pub for a beer and you met someone and told them you work in pharmaceuticals, and they'd say fantastic," he recalls. "You were a hero." Now he gets a different reaction. Drug makers are viewed as pursuers of cash more than cures. "Our industry is seen as a commercial machine not as an R&D machine," he says.

Building goodwill isn't the problem, though. The pharma companies are in the right, and it is their critics who are in the wrong. Simple public relations cannot bring about the cultural shift that is needed in order for the rights of producers to be regarded as sacrosanct as the rights of consumers.

But back to filmmaking. The big screen is weak as an educational tool for matters of philosophy and economics, but it can help concretize issues. For instance, Dead Meat, is a film produced by On The Fence Films (watch the film at onthefencefilms.com) that shows the reality of healthcare under Canada's socialized medical system. Directors Stuart Browning and Blaine Greenberg explore how the Canadian system forces patients to wait for medical care, and by the end of even the 25-minute short version this consequence of rationing is inescapable to any honest viewer.

A feature-length version of Dead Meat is also expected to be released this summer. Perhaps it will find a following as a type of Moorean antidote.

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