The First Amendment project
(DVD Video)

Special features: Fox vs. Franken: Comic strips [PDF file, requires a DVD-ROM drive and Adobe Reader], Director biographies [text feature]; Poetic license: Mario Van Peebles: interview outtakes (5 min.), Amiri Baraka outtakes (17 min.), Amiri Baraka: Official statement [PDF file, requires a DVD-ROM drive and Adobe Reader], Director biography [text feature]; Some assembly required: Deleted scene: Profile of a protester (3 min.), Photo gallery [slide show], Director biography [text feature]; About Docurama [text feature]; Catalog/trailers.

Fox vs. Franken: animation created by Thomas Bayne, Aaron Hughes ; editor, Dave Gauff.

Poetic license: director of photography, Mark Benjamin ; editor, Sharon Franklin ; composers, Jeff Bhasker, Grey Morgenstein ; piano accompaniment, Vijay Iyer.

Some assembly required: directed and edited by John Walter ; camera, John Walter, Sarah Ball, Adriane Giebel ... [et. al.].

Fox vs. Franken: Al Franken, Floyd Abrams, Carole Baron, Denny Chin, Mitch Hoffman, Bill O'Reilly, Susan Saulny.

Poetic license: Interviewees Amiri Baraka, Liam Rector, Jeremy Glick, Sheryl McCarty, Hans Haacke, Kenneth Jacobson, Lem Coley, Deborah Jacobs, Mark Goldwert, Stanley Crouch, Michael Meyers.

Some assembly required: Cass Sunstein, Nancy Parish, Alex Vitale, Katha Pollit.

Fox vs. Franken: In an absurd convergence of circumstances, Fox News filed a lawsuit against liberal imp Al Franken (they objected to his parody of their slogan "fair and balanced") in order to coddle star pundit Bill O'Reilly. The real joke is how badly Fox's efforts to muscle Franken backfired, putting them in the middle of a story so crazy, it reads like something Franken could have invented for one of his own books.

Poetic license: Explores the uproar surrounding controversial poet Amiri Baraka, and the furor over Baraka's post-9/11 poem, "Somebody Blew Up America, " in which the poet draws a difficult comparison between the terrorist attack and long-simmering internal problems in America that have been elided in our outrage toward foreign enemies. Marxist Baraka has long been known for his confrontational writing designed to challenge the white establishment, particularly during the "black power" heyday of the '60s.

Some assembly required: This film examines the protests during the 2004 Republican National Convention focusing on the disconnect between society's desire for order and the NYPD's overzealous application of force in stamping out potential threats to the placid image of the GOP's "big tent." Mainstream media downplayed the protests to the point of near-invisibility during the convention, so this portrait of articulate protesters serves as a corrective.

DVD; NTSC; Dolby digital stereo.