After taking on General Motors, the U.S. gun culture and the Iraq war, Oscar-winning director Michael Moore has found a target designed to connect with all political affiliations: America's ailing health care system.

His new documentary, Sicko, goes straight for the heart, recounting the stories of people who were unable to get needed medical care for themselves or their families.

Moore, 53, says that Sicko is a departure from his past take-no-prisoners works. "I made this film in hopes of reaching across the great divide in this country, so I made it in a nonpartisan way," he told the AARP Bulletin. "I started with the premise that illness knows no political stripe."

In the movie, Moore visits Canada, England and France, where medical care is free—or at least taxpayer-funded. He takes 9/11 rescue workers suffering from various illnesses to the U.S. Naval Station in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for medical attention; they are ultimately treated in a Havana hospital. Because of that stunt, he's now under federal investigation for allegedly violating the Cuban trade and travel embargo.

Moore says he is buoyed by the early response to the film: "I've had Republicans come up to me after a screening and shake my hand and thank me."

After all, he says, Sicko "isn't just about health care—it's about how we treat ourselves as human beings."

An extended discussion of 'Sicko'
with Michael Moore

Moore's Sicko, a look at America's health care system, may be his most powerful plea yet for social and cultural change. The documentary, opening nationwide June 29, compares the plight of Americans dealing with private insurers with the taxpayer-financed health care systems in Europe, Canada—even Cuba. Writer Julia M. Klein caught up with the 53-year-old Moore by phone after the film's rapturous reception at the Cannes Film Festival.

Q. What were your inspirations for making Sicko?
A. I had a show on NBC in the mid-'90s called TV Nation. I had an idea then: "Why don't we have a health care race between Canada, the United States and Cuba, and see who's got better health care?" And so we set up a "Health Care Olympics." Cuba won. The censor on network TV said, "You can't say Cuba won." We had to switch it to Canada…. Lately, I've been thinking about the larger question: Why are we the only Western industrialized country that doesn't have free universal health care, and why would we want to treat each other this way? It became more of a quest to take a look at our values and who we are as a people.

Q. Why did you decide to focus mainly on people with health insurance?
A. To focus on people without health insurance, it's a little too obvious. What needs to be said other than they should be covered? When I put out a call on my website for people to send stories, the consistent and overriding theme was that people with health insurance were being put through one hoop after another.

Q. What did you find out that surprised you?
A. I was surprised that the health insurance companies actually have own their own internal studies that show them what the risk is to them in denying care: How many people can they let die and get away with it?

One of the most surprising things happened in London, when I was interviewing a doctor. He makes a little under $200,000 a year—and he gets bonuses from the government when they look at his record to see if he brings down people's cholesterol, blood pressure, sugar numbers or gets people to quit smoking.…The government incentivizes doctors to do preventative medicine and take care of patients. I thought that was a genius idea.

Q. The film, like much of your work, is really an attack on unchecked American capitalism, right? Is that why you venture off into subjects such as child care?
A. I think it's all connected. The same political apparatus in this country controlled by corporate money not only denies us health care, it denies us proper day care for our children, it makes college education difficult to afford. That's why the film isn't just about health care. It's about how we treat ourselves as human beings, how we want to structure ourselves as a society. If we start operating from "we" instead of "me," we will have a much better society.

Q. What sort of responses have you had to the film so far?
A. Powerful responses—more powerful than [from] anything I've made, again from all kinds of people. I've had Republicans come up to me after a screening and shake my hand and thank me. I'm most touched by that. Because all of us want to live in a society where we have our political differences but realize one basic thing: we're all in the same boat and we sink or swim together.

Q. Why didn't you directly confront the insurance company or pharmaceutical company CEOs in the film?
A. I didn't want the focus to be on any individual company….[Besides,] their side is told almost on a daily basis with the advertising that they buy.

Q. What do you think about the quality of care in the United States?
A. The quality of the care—if you can get it—is comparable to other industrialized nations.

Q. Or better?
A. In some specialty areas, absolutely. Another thing we're good at is we have one of the best socialized medicine systems in the entire world: it's called Medicare.

Q. You'd like to see a government-run, single-payer system?
A. That's correct.

Q. Has making the film prompted you to take better care of yourself?
A. I thought it was a little hypocritical to be talking about the health care system and not take care of my own personal health. I've dropped about 30 pounds now.

Q. What role do you see for AARP on the health care issue?
A. I'm hoping that AARP will take the lead…and leave a legacy for the next generation, so when they reach an older age, they will not find themselves in such a tragic position.