Tribeca Documentaries Tackle Urgent Subjects
variety.comAddie Morfoot ContributorTimely topics including abortion, freedom of the press, the opioid crisis and the Boy Scouts of America bankruptcy case serve as the subject matters of four documentary features premiering at this year’s Tribeca Festival.In “Battleground” director Cynthia Lowen follows three women in charge of anti-abortion organizations, who are devoted to overturning Roe v.
Wade. While the efforts of pro-choice women determined to safeguard access to safe and legal abortions are also featured in the doc, Lowen felt it necessary to focus on “anti-choice actors.”“In 2019 I went down to Alabama and originally was filming with several pro-choice advocates in the state about the abortion ban,” Lowen says. “But I quickly realized that to really understand what was happening at the local clinic and state level I needed to take a step back and get this bird’s eye view of the power structures that were in play that were enabling the anti-abortion movement to be so successful, even though they represent the minority of what Americans believe and want.” “Battleground” reveals that pro-choice advocates are not just old, white men, but instead savvy young women, even Democrats, who throughout the years have been very strategic and organized in their pursuit to overturn Roe.
With the news that the Supreme Court may soon overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling legalizing abortion, the docu is poised to become an instruction manual of sorts for the pro-choice movement.“Giving a window into the anti-abortion movement I hope will be really useful and catalyzing for pro-choice audiences,” says Lowen.
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