Film Arts Fest: Wellstone!
KQED listeners and Howard Deaniacs patiently lined up in the on-again off-again drizzly evening outside the Roxie, reading complimentary copies of Mother Jones and blocking the entrance to Dalva, as a sodden and trodden election flyer featuring Matt Gonzalez endorsing Calvin Louie for treasurer looked forlornly up from the sidewalk.
Before Dean vowed to take back the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party, there was Paul Wellstone (from whom Dean stole the line). The voluble and ebullient Carleton political science professor was advocating against both Iraq wars before it was cool, and fought tirelessly for universal health care and energy reform in the 12 years he spent as a Minnesota senator. Some say he's one of the inspirations for the West Wing's President Bartlet (down to their diagnoses of multiple sclerosis).
Tragically, Wellstone, his wife and daughter, three other campaign staffers, and two pilots were killed in a plane crash 11 days before the 2002 election, right as he were pulling ahead of Republican (and now Senator) Norm Coleman in the polls. We all know how the rest of that election turned out for America. Now, Wellstone supporters have put together Wellstone!, a documentary about Wellstone's life and the power of idealism to make a positive change, which showed as part of the Mother Jones Agitators and Instigators series of the 21st Film Arts Film Fest Saturday night at the Roxie.
Wellstone! (which was named for Wellstone's famed kelly-green campaign posters, exclamation point intact) is a straightforward biography of a man well on his way to becoming a progressive Democratic legend. Good-naturedly goofy photographs of Paul Wellstone in his high school wrestling unitard and flirting with his high school sweetheart (and later wife) Sheila flash by in conjunction with photographs of Paul's older brother, who was diagnosed with mental illness in Paul's teens, and who inspired Wellstone to reach across the aisle to co-sponsor with Republican Pete Domenici a bill requiring parity in insurance coverage for mental illness.
When Wellstone decides to run for the Senate in 1990, the movie really picks up -- they run some of Wellstone's famous ads from that campaign, show some hilarious footage of his public TV debates, and show him arriving in to DC in his big green school bus, tears in his eyes. (Wellstone was all about the emo.) Then, it's a dizzying array of fiery speeches, all with Wellstone in varying degrees of beardedness. (We liked the full Stephen Keaton beard the best, though the little goatee was entertaining too.)
They don't shy away from the bad stuff either -- the movie shows Wellstone under attack for an anti-war rally by the Vietnam memorial, and show the dismay of his staffers and supporters over his yes vote in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act. Wellstone sounds like he might have been kind of a difficult (but well-loved) boss at times, and campaign staffers cheerfully tell stories about his various wig-outs.
So, after the crash, what do we do now? The movie shows the funeral service for which the Republicans made so much hay in 2002 (we gotta say, after seeing this movie, Wellstone wouldn't have wanted it any other way) -- and then shows how the Wellstone supporters have started the group Wellstone Action to help grassroots activists gain political office. Get out there and make a difference!
Wellstone! was preceded by a short film called Hush, contrasting the noises of the city with the tranquility of nature. As proud urbanites, we're only a little sorry to say that we found the city noises much more soothing.