It was sold weeks in advance as the sure-thing controversy of the Tribeca Film Festival. Outrage, Kirby Dick’s follow-up to This Film Has Not Been Rated, would surely apply that documentary’s tactics of unapologetically biased filmed detective work to a far more incendiary and potentially politically relevant collusion of power: the “brilliantly orchestrated conspiracy” of secretly gay Republican politicians, “self-hating gay people” all who secretly, shamefully practice the same acts for which they seek to punish others via discriminatory policy. But as it turns out, Outrage is less a work of original, intrepid muckraking than a ride-along with a few full-time muckrakers of the blog and satellite radio spheres, one that considers arguments for and against involuntary outing on the road to defending the responsibility of the public servants to practice what they preach.
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And the right thing sure ain’t any sort of riff on Jungle Fever. Spike was in Toronto promoting both his film Miracle at Saint Anna and the relatively new online film festival Babelgum, where he serves as “the ultimate jury.” Meaning, he picks the final winner.
We caught up to ask him what he thought about vice presidential nominee and hockey mom Sarah Palin, and it looks like he wants a showdown between Barack and Sarah.
“I think with that speech…when she said that speech it allowed Joe America to go after her. None of this stuff about how you can’t go off on her because she’s a woman. The stuff the she spoke, he should go after her hard. It’s time to take the kid gloves off.”
Can we assume that Spike is ready for some Democratic mudslinging? If he doesn’t ultimately direct the definitive Obama biopic with Denzel Washington playing a prominent role, then there is no justice in the world.
In the last ten years, movie screens have squashed podiums as the place for politicians to build a voter base. Should old entertainment formulas be used in politics? Do these politi-dramas spur us to action or whining? Under discussion: Sicko (2007), The Party’s Over (2000), Network (1976) and the sprawling entity known as Michael Moore.
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