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October 2006
Conventioneers |
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by Kam Williams
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Republican Convention Provides Backdrop for Cross-Party Romance Dave Massey (Mathew Mabe) is a Texas delegate to the Republican National Convention being staged at Madison Square Garden. Liberal Lea Jones is also in NYC, but she’s there as an activist to participate in demonstrations against the Bush Administration policies. He’s straitlaced and married to a Christian conservative, while she’s engaged to another bohemian, so there’s not much reason to think the two have anything in common. But it turns out that these 30 year-olds were classmates in Dartmouth, and despite their political differences and the fact that they’re both currently in committed relationships, romantic sparks to fly when they cross paths for the first time in seven years. And it is their passionate, hotel room affair, set against the backdrop of actual footage shot inside the 2004 Convention and on the surrounding streets of Manhattan, which fuels the fires of Conventioneers, a fine directorial debut by Mora Stephens. Stephens seemingly erases the line between fact and fiction, here, as she somehow managed to sneak not only cameras, but characters inside of the Garden to imbue her movie with a very convincing sense of cinema verite’. It also helps that her actors are talented and just as earnest about their leanings as they are about their sudden sexual interest in each other.Seeing Lea actually carrying a flag-draped coffin in a real march on Seventh Avenue makes it easier to buy the idea later that she is truly tortured about cheating with a rabid right-winger. And devout Dave is just as convincing, whispering sweet nothings on the phone to his wife back home, one minute, hanging up to make love with Lea, the next. In fact, the shooting of this flick was so super-realistic that the director and some of her crew were even arrested as part of a Bush-ordered sweep of protesters outside the convention August 31st. Fortunately, they were all eventually bailed out and reunited to finish the picture, but who knows whether that experience influenced the production’s left-leaning bent. Regardless, Conventioneers must be considered among the best micro-budget
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