‘Forward 13: Waking Up the American Dream’ Review: Eye Opening

Filmmaker Patrick S. Lovell calls January 15, 2008 his “personal Pearl Harbor,” the day the “world turned to darkness.” Until then, life had gone according to plan. He’d finished college, gotten married, found meaningful work as a Hollywood producer, had a child, and purchased a home. Everything was pretty much as he expected it to be. Indeed, as 2007 dawned, it seemed like the right time to take a huge personal risk; right before his 40th birthday he quit his six-figure a year job and began soliciting investors to enable him to start a company of his own.

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, the 2008 financial collapse left him high and dry. Without the promised investment dollars he’d counted on, he was suddenly unemployed, his business plan little more than a fantasy. But Lovell was not one to languish in the land of what-might-have-been and he and his wife quickly began searching for work. A few months later both were again employed—in low wage positions without benefits. In short order they could no longer pay their $2600 a month mortgage and reluctantly completed the paperwork for a loan modification. For the next three years they scrambled to pay $2000 a month, thinking that this sum would keep their creditors at bay. It didn’t.

The subsequent foreclosure shook the Lovell family to its core and forced them to take a hard look at a financial system that prizes the bottom line above all else. They were angry but used their rage to launch an investigation of the whys-and-wherefores of the financial plunge. What, they wondered, were its implications for the 10 million Americans who, like them, had lost housing as a result of it? As they dug, Patrick got inspired to fundraise for yet another project—a film exploring the crisis’ human toll.

The Samuel Bronfman Foundation—and Foundation staffer Adam Bronfman—quickly became champions of the idea and funded Lovell and cameraman Eric Vaughan’s 8500 mile trek across the U.S. Their journey took them to big cities, small towns, rural areas, and suburbs where they interviewed those who were hardest hit by the collapse as well as those who benefitted from it. The result is gripping, if heavily laden with talking heads, far too many of whom are white and male.

Nonetheless, the film’s central premise is important—and asks us to imagine what it would be like to have a government that serves workers, the poor, and the elderly and disabled as devotedly as it serves corporate interests. Along the way, members of Congress, good government activists, Occupiers, and regular folks speak to the camera. Early on in the film, for example, Congressman Henry Waxman [D-CA] is seen questioning a former Lehman Brothers executive after the company went under.
“Since 2000 you’ve taken home $480 million,” Waxman begins. “You company is bankrupt but you get to keep $480 million. Is this fair?”

Lovell lets viewers formulate their own answer. His point, however, is underscored by Common Cause spokeswoman Mary Boyle. “The American Dream is in trouble,” she says, leaving many people with little chance of achieving the modest comforts they thought were a birthright. Shortly thereafter, Lovell himself weighs in: “Dreaming the American Dream is not about left or right. It’s about right and wrong.” This simple statement is meant to jolt us into doing something to support policies that benefit the body politic over Wall Street and corporate interests. In addition, he and a coterie of other interviewees assail the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, which separated commercial and investment banking, and the Citizen’s United decision that allows corporations to give unlimited funds to elected officials and political aspirants who are carefully screened for their pro-business tilt.

Overturning these decisions, Lovell says, would make a significant dent in correcting some of what ails our nation. Yet despite these recommendations, the film is neither heavy handed nor polemical. At the same time, in urging us to construct our own American Dream, the inexplicably titled Forward 13 asks us to determine what we feel a reasonable reward for hard work and tenacity should look like. Needless to say, Lovell and his team are betting that it won’t be $480 million.

Forward 13: Waking Up the American Dream, a 97-minute documentary film directed by Patrick S. Lovell, produced by Adam Bronfman, and edited by Christian Serge Nelson. Available on DVD and Video on Demand platforms from Cinema Libre Studio, cinemalibrestudio.com. Purchase price: $19.95.