Convention is about the 2008 Democratic National Convention. Rather than focus on the charismatic politicians, however, Schnack turns the camera on those behind-the-scenes who made the event possible. He and his team tell the stories of the Denver politicians, city planners, protesters and journalists for whom this spectacular national event is local news. The film weaves together these strands into a striking tapestry of the convention experience. While Convention is saturated in the now-familiar hope and optimism that Obama brought to the nomination, turning the spotlight on how everyday citizens dealt with the DNC provides audiences with a whole new view of it.
Schnack was able to accomplish this by making the film a collaborative effort, pulling in a group of accomplished filmmakers to produce and shoot. Quite a few were in attendance on Tuesday night, including Britta Erickson (Starz Denver Film Festival), Shirley Moyers (Kurt Cobain About a Son, Gigantic), Jennifer Chikes (The Foot Fist Way), Nathan Truesdell and David Wilson (True/False Film Festival). Others not present include Paul Taylor (We Are Together, Rough Aunties), Julie Reichert (A Lion in the House), Laura Poitras (My Country, My Country), Daniel Junge (Chiefs, They Killed Sister Dorothy) and Stephen Bognar (A Lion in the House).
The Convention team at the LAFF screening
At the Q&A following the screening, Schnack said that he'd always wanted to do a collaborative documentary in the tradition of Drew Associates (Crisis, Primary). While attending the University of Missouri, he had led a team of writers and photographers in reporting on the 1998 Iowa caucuses. He had hoped to repeat the experiment at the 2008 caucuses, but the project didn't come together for a variety of reasons. Then a year ago, over drinks at the 2008 LAFF, Schnack, Erickson and Chikes decided that they thought they had both the resources and the moxie to make Convention a reality. At the time, Schnack was also working with Wilson and Truesdell on a documentary set in Branson, MO. What could have been just a cocktail conversation turned into reality as initiative and timing combined, momentum built and as Schnack said, "All the pieces just started coming together."
AJ's only rule for the crew was that they had to be focused on people from Denver. Erickson, a Denver native, had many ties to the local community, something that helped enormously when trying to win over the trust of the city officials and residents. Several of the film's subjects were also in attendance at the screening and Guillermo "Bill" Vidal, Deputy Mayor of Denver, told us that he was a bit apprehensive at the beginning of the filmmaking process. "At first I kept chasing Laura [Poitras] out of the traffic control room," he said. "There was that fear of what if something bad happens and there's a camera there? But most of the time I forgot she was there."
Subject Allison Sherry, a staff writer with the Denver Post, said that the filmmakers were quite kind during filming. She was followed by filmmakers Julia Reichert and Stephen Bognar, and told us that the first thing Bognar taught her was how to turn off her microphone. This came in handy when she got stressed out mid-Convention and high-tailed it to the ladies room for a moment of privacy, sans cameras and co-workers.
A large chunk of the film is focused on a group of activists who founded "Recreate 68," a grassroots umbrella organization that planned and provided support for non-violent demonstrations around the Democratic National Convention in Denver. An audience member asked why the doc gave so much attention to the protestors. Schnack explained that because so much of his subjects' time was spent on dealing with security issues, he felt it was an important part of the behind-the-scenes story. He said, "Afterwards, I thought about what would have happened if it hadn't gone well. If there had been violence. What would the Republicans have said?"
Luckily, there were no mishaps to report, but the constant 'what if' lends the film a sense of suspense that helps to propel it forward. The Convention filmmakers had a few of their own dicey moments while shooting. Schnack told us a story about attempting to exchange digital P2 cards and camera batteries with David Wilson. Schnack was inside the guarded perimeter surrounding the Pepsi Center, while Wilson was stuck outside. As they slipped the goods through a hole the fence, they were yelled at several times by the Secret Service. But that didn’t stop our fearless filmmakers! Said Schnack of his li'l espionage moment, "I felt so alive!"
The challenge of shooting at the DNC was only the first hurdle in making the film. The next was pulling together the varying storylines into a cohesive film. In addition to Drew Associates, Schnack and co-editor Truesdell looked to Robert Altman and Frederick Wiseman for inspiration. In an e-mail, Schnack told me, "I've never made or edited an ensemble piece before and have never had to juggle so many characters. I looked to Altman's films to give a sense of pacing as well as a feel for how to balance the various storylines. Also, once we get into the week of the convention, we use less music than in the set-up, there are more hard cuts and overlapping audio, which I think was influenced greatly by Altman.
Wiseman is obviously an influence, both in looking at the inner workings of an event/institution as well as the relationship between "the state" and "the people". Our film may be more hopeful in this latter regard than much of Wiseman's work and I think that some of our stylistic and narrative decisions deviate from what one would think of as Wiseman's method."
With two films about musicians under his belt, Schnack has always employed music as a key storytelling element, and Convention is no exception. One might expect a film that captures such a specific moment in time to use music of the era, but Schnack goes the other way. His choices range from standards such as "Happy Days Are Here Again/Get Happy" and Gershwin's "Dawn of a New Day," to Gilbert and Sullivan selections such as the "Overture" from H.M.S. Pinafore. Schnack said that when he and Truesdell were editing the film, he found a series of songs that had been composed for the 1908 Democratic Convention, which was also held in Denver.
"We started using these tracks, which we really loved and which matched the upbeat, almost whimsical quality of the early part of the film," he said. "From here, we dug into Depression-era music of the first part of the 20th century - Gershwin, Milton Ager, Barbecue Bob...But the 1908 songs kept reminding me of Gilbert and Sullivan, and I think there is a kind of operetta quality to Convention, so the use of their music felt particularly appropriate to me. Also, because of the scope of the film, the way in which we are seeing the lives of all of these people against this huge backdrop, Gilbert and Sullivan feels right - it can be both intimate and epic."
Intimate and epic are good words to describe Convention - a huge national event distilled into pristine moments that add up to create a dynamic whole. As Obama spoke about teamwork from the podium in Denver, the filmmaking team behind Convention put those words into action on the ground, proving that working together can, indeed, bear magnificent fruit.