It may be the most groundbreaking film of all times.

"Fahrenheit 9/11" has pushed into the public debate the very essence of the state of storytelling in this society. What is balance? What is objectivity? What is truth? And do citizens value a whole set of standards that the media has trumpeted as essential to our understanding of the world around us.

The truth is - Fox News began the whole thing. But wrapping themselves in 'fair and balanced' - they turned the very idea of objective storytelling into a bit of a farce. And rightly so.

Storytellers are human. And humans bring perspective. Institutions can legislate balance into their work by requiring multiple sources, equal time, separate church and state editorial boards for the Op Ed page, but in the end... Media organizations have a DNA. Fox is conservative. Shocker! But the more complex media personalities are CNN, NBC, CBS, and ABC. Because over the past three decades they've all transferred from the hands of ideological owners into the portfolio's of large multinational companies. The results are companies with a deeply conflicted internal sense of who they are. And the result - for viewers - is lots of media that's neither hard hitting nor incisive. Lot's of 'data' very little analysis.

Don't believe me? When's the last time that you heard an 'OpEd' on broadcast television. Probably 20 years. Eric Sevareid on CBS.

But networks don't do OpEd's any more. Because they've found that 'balance' and 'objectivity' is the way to escape the conflict between corporate owners and passionate individual employees. We've legislated out point of view. And told audiences that's what they want.

But 21 million dollars says they're wrong.

Because Michael Moore's film is his thesis. He looks at the facts, and adds them up as he sees it. You're free to accept his math, or engage your own brain and consider his evidence and draw your own conclusions, or reject outright his world view and therefore analysis.

But that's how information in a free society should be consumed. And it's worth pointing out that this isn't an expectation. Sure, Fahrenheit could be doing big box office because of the deeply fractured political situation - but then explain SuperSize Me? Morgan Spurlock is an unknown. MacDonald's is more of a guilty pleasure than corporate bad guy. And Fast Food isn't really a subject people are dying to see. But now with 6 million in box office, it seems like it may be worth considering.

It may be that the broadly defined genre known as 'documentary' is moving from sideshow to main stage. That independent non-fiction satisfies a need for unique perspectives, challenging ideas, and an editorial point of view that is not generated from a corporate perspective.

Clearly audiences that go in search of intelligent ideas and complex storytelling won't go to one movie a year. And DVD's will further reach into the living rooms and home theatres of a enthusiastic emerging audience.

Pretty cool - don't you think?