Michael Moore

Born: 23 April 1954
Where: Flint, Michigan

The Academy Award-winning director and bestselling writer is one of the few documentary film-makers who is a star in his own right.

His broadside at America's gun culture - Bowling for Columbine - is the highest grossing documentary of all time and the anti-George Bush Fahrenheit 9/11 ignited controversy when Disney refused to distribute it.

At 14 he attended a Catholic seminary where he studied to be a priest, at 15 became an Eagle Scout and at 18 became one of the youngest elected officials in the USA.

Turning to journalism he founded The Flint Voice in his hometown and became a counter-culture journalist in New York and (briefly) San Francisco before taking his establishment-bashing irreverence to film.

His first feature-length documentary, 1989's Roger & Me, was a study of the devastating effect that the loss of the General Motors factory had on the citizens of Flint, Michigan.

The film documents Moore's cheerful but vain efforts to bring GM chairman Roger Smith to Flint so he can see the damage for himself.

In the US, Roger & Me received an 'R' rating due to graphic scenes of one Flint entrepreneur skinning rabbits and selling their meat.

His 1994 TV series, TV Nation, was a satirical spin on television reality shows, wherein the humour grew from The Truth rather than any of Moore's own exaggerations.

So far, his only lemon has been the disappointing political satire Canadian Bacon, which lay on the shelf for nearly two years before its release in 1995.

Trey Parker and Matt Stone used many of its ideas in South Park: Bigger, Longer And Uncut.

A marksman and lifelong NRA member, Bowling For Columbine sees Moore take aim at America's unique and constitutionally-protected obsession with firearms.

In addition to film-making, he is one of America's most widely-read non-fiction authors whose bestsellers - Dude, Where's My Country and Stupid White Men - have combined to sell nearly seven million copies worldwide.

Fahrenheit 9/11, which traced George Bush's involvement in the 2000 election fiasco to the Iraq war, won the Palm D'Or at Cannes and was set to trump Bowling for Columbine at the box office.