I’m watching it now and I have to say, it does a great job capturing what Mitt Romney was going through and what he’s like behind closed doors. I have no idea if the filmmakers are Romney-fans or not, but I would guess most folks would see it as a pro-Romney movie.
I did not vote for Mitt Romney, but I am really liking the movie. I’m sure that Romney is a decent enough of a guy and it’s quite painful to see what running for major office does to the candidate’s family. I feel for them more than anyone; you can tell a lot of them don’t particularly want him to run for President…I’m not sure he comes off as wanting to as much as he comes off as feeling like he should.
Anyway, this isn’t a political praise or bashfest. Has anyone else seen the movie? What did you think?
Overall, I liked the movie quite a bit. Mitt is pretty much who I expected him to be. While I didn’t vote for him, I really doubt he would have been a tremendously incompetent President(cough, W.).
I respect the guy and I don’t think he minds not being President all that much.
I enjoyed it. I get the impression it was a pro-Romney film but it was very good at humanizing Romney and showing the behind the scenes aspects of his life. I really was happy to see how his family seemed to genuinely get along and enjoy each other’s company.
But like I said, I get the impression that was the goal (to humanize Romney and make him likable) the idea of a guy who is worth $200+ million picking up trash on a balcony the day of a presidential debate was cherry picked to achieve that goal I’m sure. Lots of scenes felt picked to achieve those goals, to make the Romney’s seem sincere, genuine and down to earth.
But I would recommend it to anyone.
The ending, for whatever reason was good. The way they both encapsulate the last 6 years with no words was good.
Yeah, it is basically pro-Romney. However, any movie that shows a candidate being normal is going to make them look better. It’s a shame we can’t see this side of these people when they run.
I know Dole came off as very uptight, prim, and proper when he was running for President. Immediately after, I saw him relaxed and realized he’s a hilarious guy. He could have won had he been like that.
I’ve read through the 2008 election night thread quite a few times, and one thing that always strikes me is the reaction to John McCain’s concession speech. Many people said that they wished that the John McCain that they saw in the concession speech had been the one running for election. I think, and others agreed, that once the pressure of trying to win the thing by meeting the expectations of millions was off, he was able to relax and be a much more geniuine, likeable guy. It’s probably something faced by many presidential candidates.
I’m interested to see the documentary. I’d guess that the filmmakers chose not to include the footage of Romney telling those Boca Raton donors that 47% of his own fellow-countrymen see themselves as victims who are entitled to freebies.
Probably, too, they left out his rhapsodizing about the Chinese factories surrounded by barbed wire, and how super it was that the Chinese were desperate to get IN to them. That idealizing of an economy in which a mass population is beset by grinding poverty bespeaks a “vision for America” that I’d guess is not widely embraced.
That’s all part of what we’re discussing – that the person you see on the campaign trail may not be the real person at all. The 47% speech was made at a private $50,000-a-plate fundraiser. Was that the place where Romney was most free to say what he really thought, or was that what he thought that particular audience wanted to hear? I’m no Romney fan, but I allow for the possibility that much of what happened during the campaign was an orchestrated attempt to win over certain voters, and may not have reflected his actual beliefs.
Well, good for the filmmakers (being even-handed). From the comments about the film seeming ‘pro-Romney’ I’d thought they wouldn’t like to remind anyone of that incident.
To some extent that may be true of a lot of politicians.
However, I’d guess that Romney does genuinely believe that a large proportion of his fellow-Americans are unwilling to “take personal responsibility and care for their lives,” as he said on May 17, 2012. (I agree that there could be some people like that living in the USA, but…nearly half the population? That seems to me to be overly harsh.)
I would suspect, too, that Romney does genuinely think that severe income inequality (such as is illustrated in the idea of Chinese people desperate to get into factories, presumably due to lack of other economic opportunity) is pretty darned swell. In the same 2012 speech, there was a tone of admiration in his voice when he said:
I didn’t take it to be pro-Romney at all – just a look at the person and his family. As others have said, the pressures of campaigning create an artificial situation that makes it impossible for us to see the candidates as people. This showed him as a person.
And I didn’t think the picking-up-trash thing was staged – I took that to be the kind of slightly OCD person he is.
This is exactly what I thought when I saw Dole on Letterman after the election. I actually thought to myself, “I may have even voted for him if he’d been like this before!” (Hey, it was a different time, with a very different GOP!)
The problem is, Republicans have to run to the right to win the primary. If they are not “severely conservative”, aggressively bashing the liberal icon de jour, and spouting the right wing media talking points, they will never make it to the general election and get an opportunity for moderates and independents to see who they really are.
Again, you’re taking his speech to a very specific audience, during a campaign, as evidence of his genuine beliefs. My point is that political fundraising speeches are not the best way to judge the genuine beliefs of any politician. It’s like claiming that a celebrity endorser really loves one particular shampoo or snack chip – just look at the video. Romney may very well believe what he said in the 47% speech. But the fact that he said it in the speech isn’t enough to convince me.
I’ve read that they didn’t show the Romney campaign’s reaction to the “47%” video - is that true? I guess that wasn’t the focus for the filmmakers, but it would have been very interesting to see that.
Can someone explain this? I haven’t seen the film yet and don’t know when I’ll get a chance to, but I’m curious about a horse’s tongue being featured in the film.
Even though I just saw it, I’m not sure I remember exactly. I am almost sure they show all of them(his family and staff and him) sitting around talking about it, which pretty much constitutes a reaction. He says something about poor phrasing or something.
I mean, he said it. It’s out there.
To be honest, he had more or less lost the election by the time that came out. Despite being a clear victory for Obama, I thought Obama would win by quite a bit more than he actually did.
Mitt’s wife is talking while in a stable. She grabs the horse’s tongue and basically says, “You can’t say anything about me now.” It doesn’t, to me, appear cruel and is only for…uh, about 5 seconds or so.