K-SCORE: 85
Director: Greg Whiteley
Spoiler Level: None
Mitt, the Netflix documentary about Mitt Romney, is excellent but tragic. The filmmaker did a great job of staying out of the story as much as possible, staying unbiased, and doing most of the work in the editing room. That’s how I like my documentaries. When the filmmaker gets involved in the real story and does way more than film, then it’s easier to ignore the subject matter.
The content depicted is everything I expected but still disturbing. These political campaigns are so fake, bloated, and ineffective at showing the real person behind the candidate that millions of people are voting, by necessity, for someone they plainly do not know or understand. In politics, style is a hundred times more important than substance, content always takes a back seat to appearances. Romney comes across quite well, discussing issues with his family, and living an admirable life; yet his campaign staff are disgraceful. They spend hours debating lighting, makeup, outfit, tone, vocabulary, and never policy. Behind that facade there is a real person making actually important decisions, things that impact the lives of others, but people either don’t know, don’t care, or think they can make an informed decision with their vote when all they’ve heard is trite slogans, vague promises, and attack ads.