✭ ✭ ✭ Read critic reviews
India, United States · 2018
1h 24m
Director Sam Pollard, Reuben Atlas
Starring Barack Obama, Andrew Breitbart, James O’Keefe, Hannah Giles
Genre Documentary, Drama, History
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For 40 years, the community-organizing group ACORN advocated for America's poorest communities, while its detractors accused it of promoting the worst of liberal policies. Riding high on the momentum of Barack Obama's presidential victory in 2008, ACORN was at its political zenith when a hidden-camera video sparked a national scandal and brought it crashing down.
Village Voice by Alan Scherstuhl
ACORN and the Firestorm fumbles with the media story, offering cable-news talking heads in montage but not digging deeply into how the story spread — or why elected Democrats believed they had to shut Acorn down. That sense of fumbling shapes the film.
The New York Times by Ben Kenigsberg
Although the documentary makes clear how some accusations proved false or overblown, perhaps its biggest flaw is that it’s too eager to hand-wave any actual mistakes that Acorn made.
Reuben Atlas and Sam Pollard’s convincing but unfocused documentary “ACORN and the Firestorm” firmly contextualizes the group’s targeted debasement and eventual downfall as a landmark event of this modern political moment — not the epilogue of the previous era, but rather the prologue of the current one.
The Hollywood Reporter by John DeFore
The doc's poignant heart is in observing how ACORN's most dedicated members have pushed to continue doing good after it was forced to close its doors.
After this battle, it will all be over.