Bowling for columbine is a narrated documentary directed by Michael Moore. The documentary attempts to make people believe that the reason why such tragedies like the columbine school shooting happen is because of the political structure of the United States and the way it is run. The choice of subject, approach, choice of shots, shot construction and soundtrack are all used to try and make the viewers agree with Moore's view on the Columbine massacre by making us feel as well as think.
Michael Moore is a notorious campaigner against the United States Government and the affects it has on the general American public. For this reason it comes as no surprise that Moore would choose a well documented case such as the Columbine shooting to try and prove once again, how the political structure of the United States is failing its public. Moore uses an approach showing the government in a negative light by proving what they say is in fact false. When interviewing an official from the Lockheed Martin weapons factory (also situated in columbine) the official attempts to explain that the weapons they make are to be used against an aggressor so they could not be linked to the cause of the columbine shooting at all, "We don't get irritated at someone and just because were mad at them go and drop a bomb on them". In the next scene the viewers are shown more than ten examples of the American government dropping bombs on Country's, killing innocent children when the cause is obviously not in self defense. This shows that there is no difference between the columbine shooters and the Lockheed Martin bombs because in both cases innocent children were killed. The approach of showing the government negatively is once again seen when President Clinton in a press conference says that he is bombing hard at Serbia's machinery of repression while making a deliberate attempt to minimize harm to innocent people.
