After close to four years since inception, my animated documentary, "Doolittle Raiders", is completed. It loosely follows the opposition to Bush from within Bush country, both inside and outside the system, with story threads bringing the action to both Iowa for the 2004 Democratic primaries, and to New York City for the Republican National Convention protests. The movie begins, and ends in Crawford, Texas, first at a protest march from the Peace House in 2003, culminating with the very beginnings of Camp Casey. It has been a pleasure to document the history, and I have done my very best to accurately represent living through these times.
MORESEY!!!
The animation style itself is one that many people may not be used to. It does not have the bold lines and flat colors of cartoons. Instead, it is what I am refering to as "live action animation". It is styled after the great realist American painters of the twentieth century, including Edward Hopper, John Singer-Sargent, and Andrew Wyeth - whose paintings can easily be mistaken for photographs at a glance. The reason I chose to animate the movie in the first place, and most specifically, in this style, is to best represent the distortion of reality that we have been forced to live in these past six years, as opposed to the reality that SHOULD have been, had Bush not been appointed by the Supreme Court, and thus bowed to as Supreme Leader.
While politicians and people who are known within the protest movement do show up from time to time throughout the course of the film, the film is really about the everyday American, awakening only to find that the America they knew had literally been replaced overnight. It is about all of us, and I made the movie for us.
The movie will be shown on Sunday evening at:
Cafe Caffeine
909 W Mary St
Austin, Texas
(512) 447-9473
http://www.cafecaffeine.com/
It will be preceeded by a Moveon.Org phone bank, and a screening of Robert Greenwald's "Iraq For Sale". If you live in Austin, or nearby and might make the day trip, hope to see you there!!!
If not, please feel free to host a screening at your own house party, anytime between now, the midtems, and for that matter, even the 2008 election, using the screening's proceeds for your cause or candidate.
You can sign up for a screening here:
http://doolittle.bravenewtheaters.com/
Or contact me directly at todd@ducttapefilms.com
Thanks so much and hope to see you there!!!
Todd Mattson
Filmmaker
"Doolittle Raiders"