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Talking to Director Anne de Mare

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A FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE BRINGS NEW DOCUMENTARY

2016 Election Inspires Director Anne de Mare to Deepen Film on Voting Protection

Election Protection LLC/Providence Productions

A project begun small and intimate for director Anne de Mare and reshaped by a troubling political climate into a full-fledged feature documentary, has become as timely as the latest headlines about red and blue states, election fraud and voter disenfranchisement.

Capturing the Flag, a Providence Productions featuring tireless voter protection volunteers, was originally intended as a short film, according to de Mare.

CHECK OUT MY REVIEW OF CAPTURING THE FLAG

“The story came to us through the lead character, Laverne Berry,” she says. Indeed Berry, a Brooklyn-based entertainment lawyer and volunteer protection worker, makes for an interesting subject.

Years ago at a polling site, Berry had an epiphany watching a janitor fashion a pushcart and chair into a transportation system for woman who struggled to walk to the polling booth. The experience drove Berry get more involved in volunteering. She also is a producer of the documentary.

“We set out to do a short film, but the tenor of the [2016] election brought things down to the fundamental issues of voting and democracy,” de Mare says. “It feels like something fundamental changed in our nation.”

And so the project was fundamentally changed, expanding to a full-length film, which follows three additional volunteers and encompasses a broader scope in detailing and investigating voter suppression.

“I think when we talk about voter suppression people think of the civil rights era and Jim Crow,” de Mare says. Shameful past efforts to deny a democratic voice to minorities was blatant. “Modern voter suppression is insidious. There are barriers combined with legislation that targets a specific group. People don’t really realize what’s happening.” They are sent to wrong polling places, intimidated because of past legal issues, deluded of their power through gerrymandering.

De Mare adds, “Making this film I learned that the battle that happens at the polls is vital.”

Despite its scope, the film maintains a level of intimacy through its on-the-ground, person-to-person perspective. If we’re given insight into voter suppression methods and historical context of disenfranchisement, the film is mostly concerned with how workaday folks, the power of regular people, make a difference.

Volunteer voter protection worker, Brooklyn-based entertainment lawyer and producer of Capturing the Flag, Laverne Berry. Photo credit: Nelson Walker III

“They care!” de Mare says. “Volunteers lobby for people to vote—to protect everyone’s rights. People have to be involved to decide elections.”

The controversial subject matter of voter suppression might seem an odd choice for a New York-based artist whose previous career involved theatrical works. “People don’t go to the theater anymore,” de Mare says. “They go to see films.” Her debut film, The Homestretch(2014), documented three homeless Chicago teenagers fighting to stay in school. The film, co-directed with Kirsten Kelly, garnered acclaim, including an Emmy.

After watching minority voters not being able to cast ballots and reliving the 2016 election, de Mare was asked how we inspire those who may be ground down by apathy?

“That’s the million-dollar question,” de Mare replies. She cites organizations like Democracy North Carolina that works to register voters as well as get them to the polls. The organization also pushes for legislation.

“I think it’s a model for what we need to look at.”

Looking ahead, de Mare has plans to rework her documentary for educational purposes.

“We’re hoping to create an hour-long ‘cut-down’ for educational use so that the film can be used by people involved in this kind of work.”

Also down the road is a historical film documenting women who worked in munitions factories during World War II, and a co-directing effort (with Kirsten Kelly) that looks at an interesting intersection of domestic violence and law enforcement.

Capturing the Flag has its world premiere at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival 2018.

 

| Marvin Brown’s Movie Review Archive

Quik Flix Hit

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Hidden Figures (2016)

Rated PG

Levantine Films/Chernin Entertainment

That Hidden Figures rights a wrong by dramatizing the little-known history of brilliant African-American women, whose work proved instrumental in putting Americans into outer space, is enough to make this essential viewing. But I was surprised the film isn’t content to quit while it’s ahead.

Directed by Theodore Melfi, the film also inspires and entertains with its unabashed appreciation of science and intelligence, and with the heady competition between the U.S. and the Russians to reach the stars—the space race. I was surprised again when it took another lap around the screenplay to explore the gender inequality of the era.

Figures even finds time, briefly but pointedly, for romance, parenting issues, and marital concerns, giving particular space to black men as providers for, supporters and admirers of these intelligent women. I love movies that celebrate intelligence and imagination. I reflect that despite the film’s risk of biting off more than it can chew, it succeeds because it’s well-written (from strong source material), directed and acted.

At so young an age, Katherine’s (Lidya Jewett) fluency with numbers grants her stamina and opportunities against the liabilities of her era: being black and female. Katherine G. Johnson’s beautiful mind ultimately leads her to NASA where as a widowed mother (now marvelously portrayed by Taraji P. Henson) she joins other black women with dazzling intellect (they are called human computers by their NASA bosses). It’s refreshing that the film takes their intelligence as a given. We know they’re smart, everyone in the building knows they’re smart, their families and friends know it too.

These women and others like them work in the far reaches of the intellectual caste—rocket scientists, physicists, mathematicians and engineers—yet they live in a time of segregated restrooms and eager suspicions. Katherine’s colleagues and carpool mates include Dorothy Vaughn (Octavia Spencer, The Help) and Mary Jackson (singer Janelle Monaé). The commute to and from work allows the women time to let down their hair and air grievances to each other.

Dorothy is a mathematician and supervisor in all but title, while Mary is an aspiring engineer, capable enough, but held back by her gender and race. Katherine’s undeniable gifts lead her to become the first “colored” woman on the Space Task Group charged with sending an American astronaut into space.

At work, it’s all business all the time, with little room for error, having at least as much to do with NASA’s exacting standards as it does the discriminatory practices of the day. Just as I’m wondering how such smart, analytical folks could waste time with petty, irrational racism, Kevin Costner’s hardnosed task force leader Al Harrison grows furious that his ace computer, Katherine, has to waste time daily running across campus to use the “colors only” restroom instead of the one right down the hall.

The women’s work intensifies with news that Russians have successfully launched a satellite into space—and then a cosmonaut. America’s history of being first, best, a global leader is on the line. The nation is stirred by the possibilities of touching the stars. It’s an era of racial shame, sure, but also a unique one in which astronauts (Ohio’s own, John Glenn!) were superheroes. At some point, the united cause to be the first nation to blast off the planet brings temporary racial reprieve. I’m reminded of how a champion sports team or Olympic squad can unite a city, state, nation of racially diverse people for the common cause of victory. The outcome of the space race might be celebrated history, but not the legacy of these amazing women. Their place in NASA and American history is equally impressive. The film gets that on the record.

The cast is a balancing act of great performances. The lead actors are, of course, exceptional—Henson and Spencer build on solid careers; Monaé emerges as a talent to watch. And note Kirsten Dunst’s (The Virgin Suicides) subtle but impactful portrayal of a tired subjugated white women who has more in common with her subjugated black subordinates than she can say. The men shine as well. Costner’s stern, all-business egghead never breaks character, but we find his humanity in the growing respect he gains for Katherine’s intellect and determination. Jim Parsons (TV’s The Big Bang Theory) gives a shaded performance as a mathematician growing bitter in the shadow of Katherine’s gifts, torn by his respect and jealousy. Mahershala Ali, who’s having a good year with this film and the acclaimed film Moonlight (which also features Monaé), is wonderful as a stereotype-busting upstanding veteran who pulls Katherine back to a long-abandoned world of romance.

Hidden Figures is entertaining, informative, a bit suspenseful and important. It’s rare to see a “black” film not involving sports that so personifies the American spirit. It’s hard to see anyone not finding elements that hook them into this outstanding film.

 

 

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