Janeane from Des Moines dir. by Grace Lee (review)

It is no revelation that politics is, at least in part, performance. But usually it is the politicians who are considered to be the performers. During the 2012 presidential election season, specifically the period between the Iowa straw poll and the Iowa caucuses, director Grace Lee and actor-writer Jane Edith Wilson decided to test what would happen if the constituency were performing as well. To do so, they created “Janeane,” an archetypical midwestern Christian conservative, gave her residence in Des Moines, manufactured a series of politically relevant life crises, and sent her out to plead her case before the gop presidential hopefuls deluging the state. The footage was then interspersed with scripted scenes and released as Janeane from Des Moines, a production that has been described alternatively as a mockumentary and a film with actual documentary elements.

Janeane from Des Moines, in what may be a proto-form of the “fake news” phenomenon that befell the most recent presidential election, raises hackles due to the fact that “Janeane” manages to convince several politicians and a number of local and national news outlets of her authenticity. The movie begins with what is perhaps that deceit’s greatest triumph: the lead-in to abc News’s caucus-night coverage, which features footage from a Mitt Romney campaign rally of “Janeane” tearfully imploring the potential nominee to “save the small families of America.” After the camera follows Romney as he presses in to hug “Janeane,” anchor Diane Sawyer remarks as she transitions to the next part of the story that it is “so moving to hear from that woman.” Whether, in retrospect, it was; whether the fact that the apparent constituent was actually synthetic matters; and whether by putting “Janeane” forward as a real voter and not an actor playing a character in a film, the filmmakers crossed any ethical boundaries—journalistic or otherwise—are valid questions. But those are not the film’s point, as Janeane from Des Moines contributes little to that more nuanced discussion. Unfortunately, there is not much else the film says either. As Lee follows “Janeane” from one campaign event to another, all viewers see and hear is the circus of well-known set pieces and well-rehearsed platitudes that has been captured every four years in Iowa for as long as the state has been politically relevant. As it is, it seems unlikely that anyone will be surprised that a character acting like the average prospective voter cannot achieve a more fulfilling electoral experience than the average prospective voter.

But as an artifact of that circus itself, there is something worth recognizing in Janeane from Des Moines. While many reviewers rightfully credited Wilson, who played “Janeane” (and is from Iowa), for the sharp, convincing, and consistent performance of her character, the locus of the film’s downfall is within the very conception of that character. That flaw is illustrative of a more universal problem, one made especially apparent by the 2016 presidential election.

The 2012 election that Janeane from Des Moines parodies was not, of course, one without consequence. But its political theater remained primarily political theater. “Janeane” and the gop picked Romney as their candidate, and Barack Obama won a second term. In the end, the political process deviated not the slightest from the confines in which everyone expected it to remain. The 2016 presidential election was, well, different. It is still too early to know exactly who missed what where, but this past election cycle revealed—and this is a cliché worthy of repetition for a very long time to come—that those who expect to be able to marshal the confines of political theater, and largely do, failed spectacularly to understand the voters “Janeane” purports to mimic. These were the voters whose concerns the elites on the right have exploited with cynical pandering, while those on the left, just as repugnantly, have dismissed as little more than the uncouth blathering of irrelevant provincials.

The character of “Janeane” appears to have been conceptualized within a bastion of that elite; indeed...