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Conventioneers
DVD Features Cross-Party Romance at Republican Convention
DVD Review by Kam Williams
 Dave
Massey (Mathew Mabe) is a Texas delegate to the Republican
National Convention being staged at Madison Square Garden. Liberal
Lea Jones(Woodwyn Koons) 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 a bohemian, so they don't really have much
in common.
But these 30 year-olds were classmates in Dartmouth, and despite
their political differences, 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 committed to her cause. 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 to Lea, the next.
Conventioneers must be considered to be among the best micro-budget
offerings in recent memory, for it effectively chronicles two
stories simultaneously: the repressive measures employed by
Republicans to suppress dissent, and a pressure-packed, fictional
affair involving unlikely lovers where something's gotta' give.
 Excellent
Unrated
Running time: 99 minutes
Studio: Cinema Libre Studios
DVD Extras: Deleted scenes, audio commentary, arrest shorts, plus
"The Makin
of" featurette.
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Lloyd Kam Williams
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 Lloyd
Kam Williams is a syndicated film and book critic who
writes for 100+ publications around the U.S. and Canada. He is a member of
the African-American Film Critics Association, the New York Film Critics
Online, the NAACP Image Awards Nominating Committee, and Rotten Tomatoes. In
addition to a BA in Black Studies from Cornell, he has an MA in English from
Brown, an MBA from The Wharton School, and a JD from Boston University. Kam
lives in Princeton, NJ with his wife and son.
IMDiversity.com is committed to presenting diverse points of view.
However, the viewpoint expressed in this article is the opinion of
the author and is not necessarily the viewpoint of the owners or
employees at IMD.
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