Recently, we hosted directors Liz Garbus and Lisa Cortés in conversation about their feature documentary All In: The Fight for Democracy.
Together they spoke about how they became involved with the project, how they made their directing partnership work, and directing a feature documentary under COVID-19.
You can catch up with all the live-tweets from the event below. All In is available to watch on Amazon Prime now.
Tonight we’re hosting a special Directors UK member event with @allinthefilm directors @lizgarbus and @misscortes. They’ll be speaking to fellow director @naddimartin. Follow #DUKallin for all our live-tweets! pic.twitter.com/5ysElC1HqV
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Darcia starts by introducing All In - an incredibly timely film about voting rights and the fight for democracy in the US #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Talking about where the idea for the film came from, Liz explains that it was simply down to @staceyabrams #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Stacey ran for governor of Georgia and lost, but it was a very close race that exposed the ways in which certain voters were disenfranchised #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
For example, felon who had served their sentences and are legally allowed to vote were being prevented from doing so #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
They realised that young people thought this was a new phenomenon, they didn’t have that historical context of poll taxes and civil rights #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
It’s also rooted in both director’s own experiences. Lisa is Afro-Latina and her parents and grandparents on both sides have all been involved in this long struggle to be enfranchised #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
And Liz’s parents were civil rights lawyers and had been deeply involved in fighting for the vote on the behalf of others #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
So “the vote” wasn’t this abstract thing to either of them in the way it often is for the average voter #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
In terms of their approach to the movie, Lisa describes it as a monster movie. A thriller where when you think you’ve won the fight, another head pops up #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
In terms of their approach to the movie, Lisa describes it as a monster movie. A thriller where when you think you’ve won the fight, another head pops up #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
That sense of an historical narrative where the battle is never quite won, is at the heart of the film #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
That sense of an historical narrative where the battle is never quite won, is at the heart of the film #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
They considered making it as a story, but ultimately they wanted it to be concise and make a movie-length statement #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
They had that historical timeline pretty set from the beginning, but then used the contemporary interviews to complement that story #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Conducting those interviews was also complicated by COVID, of course! #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
They had to become early Zoom adopters. But the editing process was quite enjoyable and Lisa was able to invest in some new pyjamas #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
The good thing about Trump’s reaction to the election is that people are talking about voting. But the bad thing is that there’s so much misinformation out there #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Hopefully their film will help to educate people. If your vote didn’t matter they wouldn’t be working so hard to take it away #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
#DUKallin pic.twitter.com/qkD9Sz0aXC
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Darcia highlights how effective the use of animation is in the film #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Liz explains that like with most filmmaking, it was a solution to a problem in that for many of these stories, very few photos or other archive materials exist #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
So they had to find another form of storytelling, and they worked with animator Michal Czubak to portray the emotion of those stories #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
In terms of splitting the project between them, Liz and Lisa initially worked in the same space, but once the pandemic started, their day would begin with a morning call to work out their intentions #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Amazon came on board very early on and they were very passionate about the story. That made them feel comfortable to partner from the get go #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Amazon also supported the outreach work that they felt was an equally important aspect of their vision for the film #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Lisa says that there has never been a better time for this story to be told. Amazon understood that and were able to do things like show the film outside their paywall, organise voter drive tours and all kinds of educational resources #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
This story isn’t ever over and that’s an important idea to get across. The monster of voter suppression manifests itself in many different forms #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
They had a lot of raw material, a lot of footage that didn’t make it into the film. But Lisa and Liz were pretty in tune in terms of what the story needed #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Amazon Prime also allows you to view annotations and deleted scenes throughout the film, so they were able to present some of that material in this way #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Lisa talks about how this present moment has changed what projects get funded - people are waking up to the appetite for diverse stories #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
She knows of people who struggled for years to make a documentary about Black Wall Street in Oklahoma - now there are three in development! #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Lisa is hoping the John Lewis Voting Rights Act will get enacted in January. We have to wait and see but as the film shows, it’s a continual process #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
Lisa explains that they can say all the things they do in the film without the fear of legal problems because they vigorously fact-checked everything. Many people don’t like the message of the film but they can’t dispute any of the facts in it #DUKallin
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
And that’s a wrap! A huge thank you to @misscortes and @lizgarbus for joining us and speaking about their amazing film. You can watch @allinthefilm on Amazon Prime now #DUKallin https://t.co/P7T1Dk36eI
— Directors UK (@Directors_UK) December 2, 2020
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