October 23, 2023

"In the compulsively watchable 'The Insurrectionist Next Door,' Alexandra Pelosi visits rank-and-file people arrested because of their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol."

"And then, instead of condemning, she asks them about themselves. Her brisk emotional portraits of Americans are disarming, unpredictable, funny, sad, and, yes, at times enraging. Palming her own camera, "Pelosi fires away why’s and what’s-your-deal’s to her polite subjects: a genial former wrestler; a military man who shares a love of wine with his husband; a family guy with a 'Proud Boy' forehead tattoo and a rabble-rousing hit rap song; and a practitioner of parkour who apparently learned about some kind of war in 1776 from a Trump speech."

Writes Nicolas Rapold, in "'The Insurrectionist Next Door' Review: Getting Personal In her latest film, the documentarian Alexandra Pelosi has disarming chats with people who participated in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol" (NYT).

I'm only about a third of the way into it, but I like the style, because it's personal. It de-mob-ifies the mob and shows us individuals. 

Here's the trailer (which is good except for the an annoying music that is not in the movie and that injects urgency and suspense that utterly misrepresents the mood of the movie):

 

68 comments:

Enigma said...

Where's the similar documentary on the mostly peaceful summer of 2020, where BLM / Antifa did very peaceful stuff with bricks and Molotov cocktails? I'm guessing none of them could be found? Those in masks left no trace? They didn't want to talk? Somebody doesn't want to go there? Someone destroyed the Twitter and Facebook discussions already?

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Will it include the documentary footage she “just happened to be filming” of her mother on J6? Does she ever ask mom why security was so ridiculously lax on such a momentous occasion? Is the guy who just spent his 1000th day in jail without a trial interviewed?

Rusty said...

Alexandra Pelosi is Nancy Pelosi's daughter.
Ya think maybe there is an agenda?
Let's watch and see how even handed it is.

paminwi said...

The United States DOJ May believe all these people are insurrectionists, but they know they can’t prove it. Because otherwise, they would’ve charged these hundreds of people with insurrection and not a single person has been charged with insurrection. But it’s a hot button word so she hast to use it so her liberal followers will still stroke her.

Big Mike said...

@Althouse, you and Alexandra Pelosi both need to get into churches and pray on your knees that you never see a real insurrection.

Aggie said...

Well! With the gift of mama's access, and a little downpayment of agitation propaganda, she has set herself up with a nice cozy little project, now hasn't she? A regular Studs Terkel, with Marxist frosting.

It's nice to have indulgent parents.

Gusty Winds said...

There was not insurrection on J6. But the voter fraud was a coup against the American voter.

Then, the US Gov't went on to hold domestic political prisoners.

This is just more propaganda.

AMDG said...

She did a documentary on the 2000 Bush campaign called “Journeys With George”. It was quite good. Her portrayal of Bush was favorable even though she acknowledges their political differences.

If this documentary is anything like the. Use documentary then here treatment of the subjects should be fair.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

The title alone is despicable propaganda. IF by some miracle it is meant to be tongue in cheek, it falls flat as humor, as well as "documentary" except under the post-modern sense of the word.

jj121957 said...

She should go to Gaza and give Pallywood some style.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

A bunch of pro-Hamas leftists just entered the capitol building the other day.


Why is it illegal for non-leftists to enter the Capitol building? Especially considering the doors were held open, doors were unlocked, and in some cases held open by police officers.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

Pelosi asks:
"what was it inside of you, that made you think, I'm going to go inside of the Capitol."

1) Federal Agent plant, Ray Epps, urged me to.
2) I thought the Capitol belonged to "we the people"

Guess not - Capitol only belongs to leftists with grievances.

rehajm said...

Where's the similar documentary on the mostly peaceful summer of 2020, where BLM / Antifa did very peaceful stuff with bricks and Molotov cocktails?

...but those people are organized and paid-for terrorists. The people in this story are the equivalent of the screaming women disrupting the SCOTUS confirmation, disrupting democracy. The question to ask is were are those screaming women now? How are their lives after incarceration... What? They were never incarcerated?

Asymmetries...

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I remember Pelosi from her Bush 43 campaign coverage. It kind of focused on Bush’s personality. I believe it might’ve been helpful to Bush. Who knows it might help these people show their true selves. Insurrectionists is an unfair characterization.

Ampersand said...

The dopiness component of Trumpism sucked in too many gullible people.

Fredrick said...

More than a thousand were arrested for 'insurrection'. How many were actually convicted of insurrection?

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Max, formerly HBO, is also carrying the baseball playoffs. It’s a result of cellular phones companies competing with each other for the finite number of subscribers.

rcocean said...

Insurrectionist. Not quite. Love how the liberal/left always gets to make up and apply labels to whoever they don't like. Burn down a city? you're just an "activist" or a "peaceful protester" or maybe just a no-labels persn concerned about racism and inequality.

Walk around the captial on J6, and you're an insurectionsit. Because, you see, you were "trying to overthrow the Government". Bizzare and crazy. And a lie.

Has Althouse posted about the Leftwing colorado judge who allowed a lawsuit to keep Trump off the ballot to go forward? Y'see under the 14th admendment, "No person shall ...hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof"
So Trump you see was an insurectionist because...ah...some reason. But notice that it does NOT matter what the original meaning was. It doesn't matter what any commonsense reading of the word is, all that matters is some Judge deciding that Trump's action constituted and insurrection against the USA.

"The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things. ' 'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master — that's all.”

Again, the Right can never get it. The left sees that Judges have unlimited power, and so they pack the judiciary to enforce their will. That's it. The Left does care if they're "crazy" or "Stupid" or "Unreasonable". They see power and they will use it against their enemies. Period. Mocking them and attacking them is the only way to stop them. Engaging them in debate or pleading with them to be reasonable is a loser. Its never worked.

DINKY DAU 45 said...

bingo

wendybar said...

It's almost like the whole thing was planned and Nancy's daughter was there to capture it all on tape.

chuck said...

Attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Snort. I hope the film is better than the reviewer.

n.n said...

What lies beneath. That said, all's equitable in choice and abortion.

rehajm said...

Does she ever ask mom why security was so ridiculously lax on such a momentous occasion?

You mean the occasion of the first time Democrats pulled off the stealing of a Presidential election? I bet they are too ashamed to discuss it. The first time was supposed to be Hillary!...

n.n said...

There are diverse precedents for Pelosi to exercise liberal license in order to indulge publication of handmade tales. #HateLovesAbortion

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

She did a documentary on the 2000 Bush campaign called “Journeys With George”. It was quite good.

True enough but like Jimmy Fallon, who "humanized Trump" by ruffling his hair on live TV in 2016, she is now paying penance for greatly offending all the "correct" people, and this "documentary" is more of her overcorrection. Just a comparison Of "travels with" and "insurrection" in the titles shows she's moved from neutral territory to decidedly taking a side. Sad!

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

The dopiness component of Trumpism sucked in too many gullible people.

What a sad comment. The only gullibility exhibited on J6 was people thinking they would be treated equally under the law for doing what Leftist protesters routinely get away with. So according to you it's "dopey" to believe in the American ideals we were raised on.

Jersey Fled said...

Attack?

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

A bunch of pro-Hamas leftists just entered the capitol building the other day.


J-6: Why is it illegal for non-leftists to enter the Capitol building? Especially considering on J-6 (National Leftist celebration holiday) the doors were held open, doors were unlocked, and in some cases held open by police officers.
*fixed*

Robert Cook said...

"Where's the similar documentary on the mostly peaceful summer of 2020, where BLM / Antifa did very peaceful stuff with bricks and Molotov cocktails? I'm guessing none of them could be found? Those in masks left no trace? They didn't want to talk? Somebody doesn't want to go there? Someone destroyed the Twitter and Facebook discussions already?"

It is unlikely law enforcement officials are inclined (or permitted) to sit before cameras and answer questions about the part played by police agents provocateurs and far right agitators in disrupting the protests with violence and destruction of property for the purpose of discrediting BLM.

tommyesq said...

a genial former wrestler; a military man who shares a love of wine with his husband; a family guy with a 'Proud Boy' forehead tattoo and a rabble-rousing hit rap song; and a practitioner of parkour who apparently learned about some kind of war in 1776 from a Trump speech

That does not sound very "rank and file" America to me.

Robert Cook said...

Insurrection? How dopey! It wasn't an insurrection. It was a revolution.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

J-6 - what ever happened to John Sullivan? - the Antifa freak who was caught on camera who admitted to his pals "Yeah! we got in!" - as he was the first to break a widow?

Destruction of property seems like a big deal.

*fixed*

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

...for the purpose of discrediting BLM.

I'm sorry. I usually don't engage, but this is so blatant I just had to mention it before google memory holes it.

Link to NY Post.

Butkus51 said...

Damndest coincidence that she was there.

Someone must have tipped her off.

Who could it behttps://youtu.be/SECVGN4Bsgg

Gusty Winds said...

It is unlikely law enforcement officials are inclined (or permitted) to sit before cameras and answer questions about the part played by police agents provocateurs and far right agitators in disrupting the protests with violence and destruction of property for the purpose of discrediting BLM.

Who benefited from the 2020 riots and J6? BLM leaders made a shitload of money. Racial divisions were stoked.

Democrats, the GOPe, and our Deep State benefited. Agent provocateurs, which I do agree were planted during the 2020 riots, and J6...certainly massaged and agitated the situations for a purpose that isn't so hard to figure out.

Expect for people who think it was "far-right" agitators and have the analytical acumen of a gerbil. That's just stupid. There was no predictable benefit for the "far right" to promote chaos in either situation.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

So according to Cook it was cops killing cops in the 2020 summer of love. FFS.

David53 said...

Jake Lang has been incarcerated, awaiting trial for over 1000 days. Regardless of the reason, that’s just plain wrong.

Strangely, he is allowed to have a podcast from prison. Google it up.

stlcdr said...

You mean to tell me, these people are just 'normal people?!

Shocked! Shocked, I tell you!

mikee said...

All those insurrectionists were turning their lives around. They were sweet men and woman who loved their families. They helped friends and were kind to the old folk in their neighborhoods. They were gonna get jobs and be productive members of society. They would never hurt a fly! They didn't do nothing!

Is there a tag for this docudrama like "banality of evil"?

hombre said...

Cook: "...the part played by police agents provocateurs and far right agitators in disrupting the protests with violence and destruction of property for the purpose of discrediting BLM.


Yes, there really are people this stupid.

Of course, now that BLM leaders have acknowledged that they are "trained Marxists" it was predictable that Cook would turn a blind eye to their embezzlement and blame the usual suspects for BLM/Antifa violence. Police provocateurs? In Portland, Seattle, Minneapolis?

Where are all the pretrial jailings, Cook? The prosecutions for insurrection, destruction of government property? Millions more than J6.

This is not even good comic relief from you.

hombre said...

"That does not sound very "rank and file" America to me." 10/23/23, 11:06 AM

This is a Pelosi. The obligatory gay must be included with the ignorant deplorables blindly following Trump.

Michael K said...

Pelosi was right there on J6 to film her mom "evacuating" the Capitol with her entourage of hangers on.

Kevin said...

It must be difficult to hold the camera still when you’re looking around to find where they hid the cockfighting ring.

Jupiter said...

Does she interview scaffold commander?

walter said...

Worst insurrection ever.
More shots fired down Spaz Pelosi's gullet while watching the moment she was waiting for.
How're we doin' on the pipe bomber?

Robert Cook said...

"So according to Cook it was cops killing cops in the 2020 summer of love."

What cops were killed in summer of 2020 (connected to the riots)? How many and where?

Iman said...

Her name is a non-starter. This is drivel and she needs to come clean on her involvement in planning her puff-piece vanity exercise filming of Nanski Pelosi’s “heroic” actions on 1/6/21.

Fuck each and every one of ‘em.

Iman said...

“It is unlikely law enforcement officials are inclined (or permitted) to sit before cameras and answer questions about the part played by police agents provocateurs and far right agitators in disrupting the protests with violence and destruction of property for the purpose of discrediting BLM.”

What a steaming pile of a horseshit opinion.

The Crack Emcee said...

I get it. This is like when she "humanized" George W. Bush. But I'm still with everybody else on this one:

On Jan. 6th, she should've had her camera pointed at her mother.

Ann Althouse said...

“ On Jan. 6th, she should've had her camera pointed at her mother.”

This documentary isn’t made on January 6. It’s made by interviewing people who were participants on January 6 but much later. You see particular individuals people who were prosecuted for what they did and you hear what they were thinking why they did it. It is told through their own words. I don’t know why you wouldn’t want to watch such a thing. I thought it was excellent. There’s a lot of opinion by people who haven’t watched the movie so I would just suggest that you watch the movie and get back to me.

Jim at said...

... and far right agitators in disrupting the protests with violence and destruction of property for the purpose of discrediting BLM. - Cook

Stupidest thing you've ever written here. By far.

The Crack Emcee said...

Ann Althouse said...

"This documentary isn’t made on January 6.....There’s a lot of opinion by people who haven’t watched the movie so I would just suggest that you watch the movie and get back to me."

Either I wasn't clear or you misunderstood what I was saying: I understand what the movie is, and what it's about, but - enjoyable or not - I think a better use of Alexandria Pelosi's time would be spent dealing with her mother's issues. A film about anything else is a distraction. I know the people on January 6 are human beings. What I wanna know is how her mother can work with a three time rapist like Bill Clinton? Does her mother know what Burisma is? Why has her mother never straightened out the lies around Harvey Milk and Jim Jones and the People's Temple and that stolen election?

All I'm saying is, Alexandria Pelosi has better things to do with her time than showing the world "a genial former wrestler; a military man who shares a love of wine with his husband; a family guy with a 'Proud Boy' forehead tattoo and a rabble-rousing hit rap song; and a practitioner of parkour who apparently learned about some kind of war in 1776 from a Trump speech.".

She could be showing the world how - with her mother's help - America's been taking a lot of seriously wrong turns for a long, long time.

Goldenpause said...

More from the Pelosi family. The only thing missing is the theme from The Godfather.

Dixcus said...

"You see particular individuals people who were prosecuted for what they did and you hear what they were thinking why they did it. It is told through their own words. I don’t know why you wouldn’t want to watch such a thing."

Jesus fking Christ, are you so insipidly stupid that you don't think people don't understand how the Democrat Party that you've been a member of your entire life works?

We know how it works.

I mean, what kind of a comment is this by a self-avowed intellectual in this country (with zero evidence of that fact). Have we sunk so low? That we're entertaining comments of this low quality from a bunch of fat old gray chicks who had to internet-date to find a gardener to make sure she don't stumble to death on her daily walks to her horrid ice beach?

Ann, you know, you occasionally prove why you were advanced in the same teaching profession that has us creating a bunch of fking morons in this country.

You are sometimes the dumbest human being I've ever come across. It may be intentional, but if it is, then your humor is lost on ordinary humans.

/s (which you won't get).

~ Gordon Pasha said...

What’s the longest time that the real Insurrectionists of 1861-65 ever spent in jail after the end of the Civil War (now THAT was an Insurrection)

Rich said...

147 members of congress voted against Biden’s electoral win without any proof of election fraud. Some of those members were part of a planned coup. Some asked for pardons. Now those same people are still waging the big lie.

I personally know someone who believes Jan 6 was a fabrication by the media-industrial complex. How does he know this? He met someone who said he was there, and told him it wasn’t chaotic at all, and that the footage was either faked or cherry-picked. Somehow, that’s all the evidence he needed to draw a conclusion. There is a large segment of people in this country who simply will not accept what is being reported in “mainstream” news outlets, even Fox. Yet, that skepticism of what is being reported does not apply to the websites and podcasts they find in the dark corners of the Internet, where the more outlandish the story, the more believable it is. Our country does not have a shared base of factual reality, and that is a scary thing. I can’t imagine it will end well.

Political Junkie said...

AMDG at 844am. When "Journeys with George" was released, GWB still had very strong approval numbers. Was before Iraq invasion. That probably helped GWB in the editing process.

walter said...

I'm starting to think "Rich" joined forces with Jabfly to create multiple swing state shutdowns, lockouts, blocking of observers and myriad 2020 oddities he wishes to waive away.
But ids he cool with Jan 6 committee dubbing crowd noises into largely withheld footage?
Is he cool with the bizarre leniency of the very prominent Epps while others suffer ridiculous treatment for far less?
I do agree with him on this: "Our country does not have a shared base of factual reality,"
Rich is close to Baghdad Bob Cook with head in the ground..or elsewhere.

Randomizer said...

Alexandra Pelosi is not her mother and deserves to be judged on her own work. She does deserve to be judged for using an offensive slur in the title of her film. If a documentary was made about elite universities discriminating against Asians, a title like, "Me So Solly You Can't Get into Stanford" would completely discredit the film.

Michael Moore is a propagandist who makes documentaries, but even he had the good sense to not allow the title to give away the game.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

Jupiter - your link:

"In clips 4-6 of the above compilation, we see Epps actively orchestrate elements of the very first breach of the Capitol barricades at 12:50 p.m, while Trump still had 20 minutes left in his rally speech.

It is noteworthy that this Ray Epps breach occurs just one minute after Capitol Police began responding to reports of two “pipe bombs” located at DNC and GOP headquarters, respectively. Rather conveniently, the already-handicapped Capitol Police thus had still-fewer resources with which to respond to the barricade breach in question.

While the “pipe bombs” turned out to be a dud, the Ray Epps breach proved fateful. Today, the official stories told by the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the US Justice Department all depict the apparent Ray Epps-orchestrated 12:50 p.m. initial breach of metal barricades as the “Big Bang” event of January 6.

In large part, this description is hardly an exaggeration. Indeed, it was the 12:50 p.m. breach of the Capitol grounds, in conjunction with a handful of suspicious individuals ripping down fencing and signage, that set in motion the conditions allowing for 1/6 to turn from a rally into a riot.

In this report, we will blow open this network of still-unindicted key operators who appear to have been at work either with or around Ray Epps during the initial Capitol grounds breach. You, dear reader, will be scandalized — though perhaps unsurprised — to learn that none of the actors covered in this report have received attention in the mainstream press, despite their active and indispensable roles in the events of 1/6. "

Not found in MSM(D)

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

The Ray Epps story needs telling. MSM(D) - deny and lie

the FBI originally put Ray Epps’s face on its Capitol Violence “Most Wanted List” on January 8, 2021, just two days after 1/6. They offered a cash reward for information leading to his arrest. In fact, rank-and-file FBI agents initially deemed Epps’s role as an apparent riot organizer so important that they named him Suspect #16—one of the first 20 high-profile FBI targets in a database now packed with more than 500 suspects.

Then, six months later on June 30, 2021, both Revolver News and The New York Times published inconvenient stories that encouraged a more aggressive interrogation of the “Ray Epps third rail,” leading reasonable people to wonder why this publicly identified man on the Most Wanted List still had no charges filed against him.

The FBI responded to these important media stories the very next day. But their response was to quietly purge all online Ray Epps files from their website, then switch to a posture of “What? Who? Ray Epps? Never heard of him.”

Rusty said...

Randomizer said,
"Michael Moore is a propagandist who makes documentaries, "
Let's get this straight. Both Michael Moore and Alexandra Pelosi make propaganda movies. They don't make documentaries. Documentary implies there are some impartial facts involved. You aren't going to see anything that hasn't been cut, filtered and edited to present to you their version of events. Facts don't enter into it. Think "Triumph of the Will."

Rich said...

Factual reality comes into more focus when claims are made in court, where lying carries penalties. Right wing conspiracy theories caused an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Their consumption-audience is addled with faux-patriotic rhetoric that has no relation to reality. They like cosplay and cultism. It’s apparently fun.

walter said...

Rich's imagined world ignores the societal and professional pressure on lawyers and judges to do anything to avoid investigating.
Ignorance is bliss.

Jim at said...

Factual reality comes into more focus when claims are made in court, where lying carries penalties.

Then why did your side do everything in your power to stop those cases from going forward? You know, where you could prove our 'conspiracies' were wrong?

Rich said...

My favorite thing is an argument where someone says they’ll change their mind if they’re provided with proof, but if provided with proof they say the proof can’t be trusted.

I think we should always try to be clear about what it would take to change our minds on a belief.

walter said...

And if engaging risks professional and societal backlash, dismiss via standing and laches etc.