On VOD & TV: FOLLOW THE LEADER

Coming to VOD tomorrow, Tuesday, June 25, and to PBS’s America ReFramed on WORLD Channel this Sunday, June 30: FOLLOW THE LEADER

Jonathan Goodman Levitt’s coming-of-age portrait of three politically-engaged teenage boys had its debut at both the Republican and Democratic National Conventions this past year. It went on to screen as part of the Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers, the PaleyDocFest, and the recently completed Northside Film, where it picked up a jury award. Cinedigm will be releasing the film on iTunes and other platforms, while Tugg makes it available for theatrical screenings.

At the start of Levitt’s doc, sixteen-year-olds DJ, Nick, and Ben all self-identified, more or less, as conservatives, but over the course of the three-year project, their political leanings diverge from any monolithic conception of that term. All are involved in student government, and all have dreams of becoming President, in some cases attending political leadership camp or volunteering for local election campaigns. Displaying the qualities of typical teenage know-it-alls, supremely confident in and opinionated about their beliefs, part of the joy in the film is watching as the more open-minded of them – Nick and DJ – mature and acknowledge that they may not know all the answers, shifting their positions or refocusing their goals. For his part, DJ, already devout, leads with his faith rather than blindly supporting one political party or ideology, eventually leading him to pursue a different calling entirely. Nick, on the other hand, finds his idealism about the potential in bipartisanship challenged more than once. And then there’s Ben… He’s decidedly the most extreme, and intransigent, in his Republican conservatism, fully aware of the dirty side to politics, but seemingly so ambitious that he’s fine with it – likely making him, in some viewers’ eyes, a great villain of sorts who you can love to dislike (“hate” is too strong a word in this context). Levitt selected three distinctive and personable subjects to follow, and stuck with them long enough to witness their transformation in their key early college years, as each contends with the ramifications of the Obama/McCain election. The result is an absorbing and intriguing look at the next generation of political engagement in a time of intense partisanship.