Politico – Film Focuses on Women of the Right
The timing couldn’t be sweeter for the makers of “Fire From the Heartland: The Reawakening of the Conservative Woman.” Just days after the Tea Party favorite Christine O’Donnell pulled off a stunning upset against GOP establishment pick Mike Castle, Citizens United will premiere a documentary in Washington next week that they say is the first “to tell the story of the awakening of a new generation of women that are at the forefront of today’s reborn conservative movement.”
The film capitalizes on what political observers and activists have already noted of this election cycle-the riders on this year’s political storm are women, a sagebrush set well-positioned to help the GOP reclaim the congress.
Following in the bootsteps of history-making 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin – an Alaskan with an affinity for “Mama Grizzlies” – a number of women candidates, including O’Donnell, Nevada’s Sharron Angle, and South Carolina’s Nikki Haley, are reshaping and reenergizing the face of the GOP.
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While women are filling in on the top of the party ticket, the documentary explores the flip side of the equation – looking at the Tea Party’s grassroots activists, like Jenny Beth Martin, and starring the more familiar female stars of the conservative movement, including Rep. Michele Bachmann, Ann Coulter and Phyllis Schlafly.
“I’m usually very loath to engage in identity politics,” says conservative commentator S.E. Cupp, who appears in the film. “I don’t know if it’s that mama grizzly instinct being awakened, if women are feeling threatened, or if it’s because women are just feeling neglected or because they’re feeling empowered but you can’t deny that there’s something happening today.”
The trailer for the film, which was directed by “Generation Zero” director Steven K. Bannon, begins with Bachmann asking Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner a question during the financial crisis, and crescendos with quotes from Coulter and Palin. Lady Gaga, the women of “Sex and the City” and a mama grizzly also make an appearance.