DOCUMENTARIES WITH A POINT OF VIEW
P.O.V. 2008: Election Day
The results of our News Hunt for good journalism on the 2008 elections are in! From July 1 - 14, P.O.V. and PBS Engage joined forces with NewsTrust.net, a nonprofit social news site devoted to finding good journalism, to review current news stories about the 2008 elections with a focus on the voting process from the perspective of the American man and woman on the street. Over this two week period, reviewers examined articles on election reform coverage from a wide range of sources, from The New Yorker and The New York Times to The Nation and The Huffington Post. See the top stories and a summary of what reviewers found over on the NewsTrust.net blog.
The News Hunt was one of the special features for the Election Day website, and while it's now closed, the hunt for good journalism never ends. Check out NewsTrust.net for more opportunities to review news stories and to participate in the effort to highlight quality journalism.
Katy Chevigny is the director of Election Day. After the film aired on P.O.V., viewers wrote in with questions for Katy on the P.O.V. Blog. Read on as she answers questions about Nader and Gore in 2000, Ohio in 2004 and more.
Mit asks: In the 2000 election, a lot of people blamed Nader for causing Gore to lose. However, Nader defenders blame the election process, particularly noting the thousands of uncounted votes due to errors in polling — illegal, non-handicapped-accessible booths, or absurdly long lines in poor neighborhoods. Based on what this film is about, does the Nader defense hold water that he wasn't responsible for Gore losing? Was it more likely the lack of proper election facilities?
Katy Chevigny: The ultimate findings in the poll count for Florida in the 2000 election, as summarized in the Election FAQ on the P.O.V. website for Election Day, shows that even with Nader in the race, Gore won the popular vote in the state of Florida. If those ballots had been counted properly and in a timely fashion, Gore would have won the election despite Nader being in the race.
David asks: In Election Day you combine 11 different stories of citizens determined to vote in the November 2004 election. Four years later, we are in the midst of another election season. That being said, I was wondering if you have kept in touch and kept up with the stories of the individuals from Election Day. If so, do you plan to do any follow-up filming this coming November?
Katy: I don't have any plans on filming this November, but my guess is that many, many other people will, and I look forward to seeing what they discover! We have kept up with many of the characters and you can see what they are up to here on the Film Update page.
Jacquinette asks: I am still enjoying this wonderful film; it gives a varied perspective on the election experience in America. I was captivated by your focus on ex-felon voting rights.
I would like to know if you are working on a film that focuses more closely with this particular issue. Furthermore, how can I get involved with this issue and help? I'm also wondering if you will be touring with this film in the near future.
Katy: I'm glad you took special note of the issue of felon disenfranchisement. This was an issue that we were particularly interested in highlighting in the film, in part because we think it is very important, and I have the sense that the public does not have great awareness of the issue.
That's great that you'd like to do more! The experts on the P.O.V. website have many great suggestions for getting more involved. One of the key ways is to volunteer to be a pollworker. Rosemary Rodriquez at the Election Assistance Commission explains a bit more about it.
We are touring with the film this fall. You can learn more about the schedule at electiondaythemovie.com.
John asks: Why doesn't your film mention the horrible disenfranchisment that took place in Ohio in 2004? Hundreds of thousands of voters were knocked off of the voter registration rolls in Ohio, and there were major problems that occured with electronic voting machines and vote flipping.
Katy: In response to viewers' concerns that Election Day did not cover the controversy in Ohio regarding the election in 2004, that is due in part to the fact that we had the made the decision before Election Day to film the events that were happening to these particular people we were following. So therefore, any events in the aftermath of the election were not covered. We were also aware that there were several other films also being filmed about the 2004 election, and we assumed that many of them would cover the details in Ohio.
Susan asks: Great film, Katy. How did you and your team decide who to follow for all of the stories in the film?
Katy: It was a massive undertaking to find all the "characters" we followed in Election Day and to gain permissions to film with all of them. Our producers Maggie Bowman and Dallas Brennan Rexer, along with our Associate Producer Christy King, each spent many weeks researching possible storylines and locations. We reached out to several nonprofit organizations working on various election issues, and they put us in touch with groups working on felon disenfranchisement, election protection, and alerted us to the fact that there were international monitors working on the elections. In addition, we sent out email blasts to hundreds of people all over the country, seeking ideas for characters or stories that were not generally covered in the mainstream new media, and chose characters based on that research.
Election Day combines eleven stories — shot simultaneously on November 2, 2004, from dawn until long past midnight — into one film that documents the street-level experience of voters in today's America. Along the way, filmmaker Katy Chevigny discovers that more and more Americans are bringing their passion for democracy to the poll. But Election Day also finds that American elections run on a surprisingly antiquated system, which often works as much to frustrate voter participation as to encourage it, and which harbors wide disparities in access between rich and poor neighborhoods.
The 2004 elections took place in the long shadow of 2000's bitterly contested presidential vote. The upcoming 2008 presidential elections will be another strenuous test on America's election system. Will the system hold up? Or will "hanging chads" and disputes be part of the conversation around the election results once again?
Filmmaker Katy Chevigny says that the American election system can often fall short and fail its voters. She says that "improving our election system is not going to happen on its own; people would need to get involved to reform the system so that everyone gets an opportunity for their vote to be counted." Do you think the American election system needs to be reformed?
In New York City, ex-felon Leon Batts has just regained the right to vote. He sees his vote as one representing all ex-convicts denied the right to vote, despite having served their time. But voting turns out to be harder than anticipated for Leon. States differ on whether ex-felons can vote. Do you think that ex-felons should be granted the right to vote across the country?
In P.O.V.'s roundtable discussion, Changing the System, we asked experts: What's the one thing you would do to improve the accuracy, access to and efficiency of the election system in America? Renée Paradis of the Brennan Center suggests a system of universal registration. What's the one thing you would suggest to improve the American election system?
Election Day skips over the partisanship to depict portraits of real people who make American democracy work. Along the way, it raises unsettling questions about the American election process. Have you ever run into problems when you were trying to vote? What do you think about America's election system?
Share your thoughts and opinions in the comments.
Why are voting laws so different from state to state? What's a poll watcher, and how can you become one? Derek Cressman of Common Cause, a voting watchdog organization, answered some frequently asked questions about the U.S. election system on the P.O.V. companion website for Election Day, a film that chronicles the 2004 presidential election in 11 cities and towns across America. Election Day premieres this week on PBS (check local listings).
The good news in Election Day is that more and more Americans are bringing their passion for democracy to the polls, drawing unprecedented numbers of voters eager to make the most of their right to cast a ballot and have it counted. Taking place in the long shadow of 2000's bitterly contested presidential vote, the 2004 election also brought more scrutiny of polling-place practices from citizens as well as international observers. The bad news in Election Day is that close scrutiny of American elections finds a surprisingly antiquated system, which often works as much to frustrate voter participation as to encourage it and which harbors wide disparities in access between rich and poor neighborhoods.
If you have a question about voting, check out our FAQ, and if your question isn't there, submit it in the comments below. At the end of this week, we'll pick one (or two), Derek will answer it, and we will add it to the Election Day FAQ feature.
Added July 15, 2008: Derek has answered two of the questions posed in the comments on the Election Day FAQ. Visit the FAQ to find out why he thinks voting is a duty, and how much your vote really matters.
To make Election Day, filmmaker Katy Chevigny fielded 14 crews to capture the action on November 2, 2004, all over the country. Election Day is as fast-paced and suspenseful as a thriller, with vote counts and political activism substituting for shootouts and car chases. The heroes of the day are ordinary Americans determined to vote, to turn out others to vote, and to see that the voting is legally and fairly done.
In our interview with Katy, she tells us that she wants viewers to get involved after watching the film:
What I'm hoping people will take away from seeing the film is that there are a lot of different things going on in our electoral process. People care about voting, and there are thousands of volunteer poll workers working long hours during every election because they believe in our country, and they believe in democracy. But our election system isn't as good as it could be.
I hope that after watching Election Day, viewers understand that we could have a better system. But improving our election system is not going to happen on its own; people would need to get involved to reform the system so that everyone gets an opportunity for their vote to be counted.
Read more from Katy's interview, find out about the technical challenges involved with melding 11 stories into a coherent film in her Production Journal or listen to our extended podcast interview.
Do you have a question for Katy about Election Day and the American election system? You can submit it in the comment field below. She'll choose a selection of questions to respond to, so check back here after the film airs to see what she has to say.
Irene Villaseñor is P.O.V.'s Youth Views manager. Youth Views is a project that works with youth, educators, and youth-serving organizations to use P.O.V. films as a tool for youth engagement. Irene writes in today to talk about how communities can organize around the 2008 P.O.V. film Election Day to reduce voter disenfranchisement, and her own experiences on Super Tuesday with the Asian Pacific American community.
On July 1, P.O.V. will broadcast Election Day, a film by Katy Chevigny that combines 11 stories that were shot around the country on November 2, 2004. The film focuses on how incredibly varied our voting experiences are across the country — we see stories of activists on the Pine Ridge Reservation as they mobilize Native voters, advocates in New York City that want to unleash the voting power of ex-convicts, and a Republican committee man in Chicago that wants to ensure that Republican voters aren't intimidated at polling stations, among other scenes from election day 2004.
This wide-angle view reveals the barriers to civic participation that some communities must overcome in order to have their votes count. The film can be a powerful eye-opener, especially for citizens who blame voters for the electoral scandals in Florida in 2000 and in Ohio in 2004.
Working with this film inspired me to reflect on how my own community, Asian Pacific Americans, struggles with voter disenfranchisement. Since May is Asian Pacific Heritage month, this is one of the best times to delve deeper into our legacies and assess how much progress has been made.
We still have a way to go.
Since 1988, the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) has been monitoring our community's participation in local and national elections. In a 2006 report to the Senate Judiciary Committee on the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (which was created to eliminate literacy tests, poll taxes and other barriers to voting), AALDEF identified that Asian Americans continue to experience racial discrimination, harassment, and institutional barriers at polls.
AALDEF's latest report, Asian American Access to Democracy in the 2006 Elections, cites incidents of anti-Asian voter disenfranchisement in 25 cities across the nation. These statistics called me forth to get involved. On Super Tuesday, I volunteered to survey Asian American voters about their experience, ensure that translators and translated materials were available, refer people to AALDEF's complaint hotline, and speak to the press about the situation.
During my shift, I discussed with the other volunteers how Election Day could be an incredible resource for people who wanted to mobilize communities for the 2008 elections and examine what deters individuals and communities from political life.
If you want to borrow Election Day for a community or classroom screening, sign up on P.O.V.'s Community Events Planner. For information on a range of election-year issues, check out P.O.V.'s Why Vote? website. And if you would like to get involved with AALDEF's Asian American Democracy Project, visit their website for more information.
Katy Chevigny is the filmmaker behind Election Day (P.O.V. 2008) as well as the co-founder of the non-profit media organization Arts Engine, whose production arm, Big Mouth Films, has produced eight feature-length documentaries. This week, Arts Engine celebrates its 10th anniversary with a series of screenings at the Paley Center for Media in New York. Katy writes in to tell us more about the occasion.
It was a little over 10 years ago when Julia Pimsleur and I started our own production company in New York to make documentary films. Our plan then, as it still is now, was to establish a creative, collaborative environment to make documentaries on a range of topics, working with a number of different directors.
Julia had just spent seven years living in Paris, where she learned how to be a producer at the French National Film School. As a result, she was inspired to borrow from the model of many French documentary production companies, in which producers bring a creative vision to their slate of films and work collaboratively with a select group of filmmakers to achieve that vision.
We started Big Mouth with a simple business strategy of developing long-form documentaries for production (our first film was Kirsten Johnson's Innocent Until Proven Guilty) while also producing work-for-hire documentary projects for European production companies. And while our production department was steadily plugging away making this eclectic roster of documentaries, we developed into a non-profit organization called Arts Engine, eventually launching the website MediaRights.org and the Media That Matters Film Festival.
Over the course of the last decade, we have completed eight feature-length documentaries by six different directors. Our two latest films were both lucky enough to find themselves a home on P.O.V.: Andrew Walton's Arctic Son was part of P.O.V.'s 2007 season, and my film, Election Day, will have its broadcast premiere on P.O.V. on July 1, 2008.
Later this week, as part of our 10th anniversary celebration, the Paley Center for Media (formerly the Museum of Television and Radio) here in New York City will be showcasing our work in a special four-day (May 1 - 4) retrospective and workshop series. For the first time ever, all eight Big Mouth films will screen, along with highlights from several years of our Media That Matters Film Festival. In addition, on Thursday, May 1, we are offering a special workshop to educators on the uses of social justice media. All screenings and events are open to the public, and the full schedule can be found on Arts Engine's website.
None of us here can really believe that it's been 10 years since we started — but we're looking forward to seeing what the next 10 years have to offer. Marking this decade of work by sharing these films with an audience is a great privilege for us, and we hope that some of you will join us at the Paley Center this weekend!
Now that it's mid-April, we're finally beginning to get a taste of spring here in New York. And that means that summer — and P.O.V.'s 21st season — are just around the corner.
Today we're taking a sneak peek at Election Day, which will have its broadcast premiere on Tuesday, July 1 at 10 PM (but check your local listings). Filmmaker Katy Chevigny wants you to forget the pie charts, color-coded maps and hyperventilating pundits. What's the street-level experience of voters in today's America? In a triumph of documentary storytelling, Election Day combines 11 stories — shot simultaneously on November 2, 2004, from dawn until long past midnight — into one. Factory workers, ex-felons, harried moms, Native American activists and diligent poll watchers, from South Dakota to Florida, take the process of democracy into their own hands. The result is an entertaining, inspiring and sometimes unsettling story of citizens determined to vote on one fateful day.
For more previews of 2008 P.O.V. films, check out our TV Schedule.
With Election Day, filmmaker Katy Chevigny takes a look back at the events of November 2, 2004. We caught up with Chevigny last week to ask her some questions about her film and find out why she believes some steps still need to be taken to ensure a fair election on November 4, 2008. Election Day will have its broadcast premiere on P.O.V. later this year.
P.O.V.: Tell us about your new film, Election Day.
Chevigny: Election Day follows eleven people participating in the electoral process over the course of the day on November 2, 2004. Through the eyes of poll workers, international observers, first time voters, former elected officials, campaigners, and voting rights activists, we tried to show what voting means to Americans. In our filming, we saw a lot of flaws in the system, but we also saw a lot of people trying to make it work.
What makes the film unusual is that we shot it all on one day. The chronology of the film starts at dawn and ends well after midnight. I was interested in the challenge of editing together footage from disparate locations and characters and finding themes and contrasts that would make the material add up to more than the sum of its parts.
P.O.V.: The 2008 presidential elections are just around the corner. What lessons can viewers, voters and officials take from Election Day to ensure that the election process is fair in November? What do you think can be done to improve the voting process in America?
Chevigny: There are many, many things we can do. There has not been sufficient political will to make the system better but there are concrete solutions, for sure. Spencer Overton's book Stealing Democracy offers a very pragmatic look at what doesn't work and why. And once you really understand it, the solutions are easier to identify. A couple of clear steps we could take: truly non-partisan poll workers, better training of election workers, and perhaps most importantly, state election commissioners should not be partisan office-holders! This is a blatant conflict-of-interest that should have been eliminated long ago. In terms of combating voter intimidation and the use of deceitful tactics that mislead voters, there is currently a bill before the Senate that would help ensure fair elections. You can track the progress of the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act online. Another practice that blocks citizens from having their votes count on Election Day is voter caging. Notoriously targeted at low-income and minority communities, voter caging happens when an organization or campaign sends mail marked "return to sender" or "do not forward" and then uses the returned addresses to challenge votes cast by citizens whose addresses might have changed since they registered to vote. For more information on this practice and what you can do about it, check out the National Campaign for Fair Election website. I also feel strongly that the math created by the Electoral College is a big part of the reason people stay at home. Let's face it: if you're in a swing state, your vote just DOES count more.
Read more after the jump...
