Gabby Giffords, center, subject of the documentary “Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down,” pictured with the film’s co-directors Julie Cohen, left, and Betsy West, June 21, 2022.
Chris Pizzello / Chris Pizzello / Invision / AP
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Chris Pizzello / Chris Pizzello / Invision / AP
Gabby Giffords, center, subject of the documentary “Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down,” with the film’s co-directors Julie Cohen, left, and Betsy West, June 21, 2022.
Chris Pizzello / Chris Pizzello / Invision / AP
For two years documentary filmmakers have shadowed former Congressman Gabby Giffords, the most jarring moment for them was in the kitchen of her hometown of Tucson, Arizona.
While the cameras were rolling, she and her husband, Senator Mark Kelly, casually opened the freezer. Kelly grabs a plastic box and reveals that it contains the fragment of Giffords’ skull that was removed after she was shot.
“This is here next to empanadas and sliced mango,” says Kelly.
Giffords’ answer was “Sera, sera,” a reference to the song “Que sera, sera” or “What will be, will be.”
The scene in the film is symbolic of Giffords’ openness to contemplation but not being discouraged by the 2011 shooting that changed her life. That desire is what led her to allow cameras into her life for two years – all in a pandemic in progress.
“For me, it’s really important to move forward, not look back,” Giffords told The Associated Press while in Los Angeles promoting the film. “I hope others are inspired to keep moving forward no matter what.”
From the filmmakers behind the Oscar-nominated Ruth Bader Ginsburg documentary “RBG,” the film “Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down” is in part an insight into Giffords’ recovery from the blast. Gunfire in January 2011 left six people dead and 13 others injured outside a Tucson supermarket. But the film, which hits theaters July 15, is also an insider look at how she and Kelly navigated the gun control campaigns and then the Senate campaign. The movie couldn’t be any slower than that with gun reform being debated in government, schools, and the US Supreme Court.
“It’s just a fascinating story about how Gabby came back from an injury that left so many people dead,” said Betsy West, co-director. “After meeting Gabby on Zoom, we saw what a great communicator she is. And we felt that we could have a lot of fun despite the very difficult subject of violence. firearms.”
At the same time, they wanted to balance out exactly how much to look back on the footage.
The film’s other director, Julie Cohen, said: “We certainly don’t want to avoid January 8. Obviously, that’s what changed her life. “But Gabby was ultimately defined by all that she achieved before and after. We wanted it to represent that achievement.”
The film also inevitably discusses Jared Lee Loughner, the gunman in the Tucson shooting. Interviews with law enforcement, journalists and a video made by Loughner show how he was able to purchase a semi-automatic weapon despite a history of mental illness. In 2012, he was sentenced to life in federal prison without parole.
“We don’t want to focus on the shooter but we also want to explain what happened,” West said. “Gabby and Mark didn’t shy away from going to sentencing hearing to make their hot-tempered call for life in prison. It’s a very important part of the movie.”
Recent mass shootings including the deaths of 19 students and two teachers in Uvalde, Texas, and 10 supermarket shoppers – all Black – in Buffalo, New York, have prompted Gun violence returns to the forefront. US Supreme Court on Thursday Repeal gun laws in New York. The case involves state law that makes it difficult for people to get permits to carry guns outside the home. The judges held that the request violated the Second Amendment’s right to “hold and bear arms.”
Also on Thursday, US Senate easily passes bipartisan gun violence bill. Closed talks for weeks have resulted in an incremental but landmark package in response to mass shootings. The House of Representatives will vote on Friday.
Like after Uvalde, the documentary recounts how debates over gun control came to a head after 26 children and two teachers were shot dead by a gunman at a school in Newtown, Connecticut. Giffords and other supporters, including some Newtown parents, were called “props” by National Rifle Association officials. Having spent time with Giffords and others affected by gun violence, the film’s directors say their voices were the focus of the discussion.
“To say that somehow Gabby shouldn’t be talking about gun violence because she’s experienced it? That doesn’t really make any sense,” Cohen said.
A key element of the documentary comes from the videos Kelly shoots Giffords in a Tucson hospital and at a rehab facility in Houston. These include then-President Barack Obama – who is interviewed in the film – and Michelle Obama’s visit to the unconscious Giffords’ hospital bed. They also cover the first few months of speech therapy.
The bullet passed through Giffords’ left hemisphere of the brain, where language abilities are served, leaving her with aphasia. You see in old videos Giffords sobs from frustration trying to read and has trouble saying “chicken”.
Giffords said watching those videos can make her sad, but she’s determined to stay optimistic.
“I’m getting better. I’m (getting better) slowly but surely I’m getting better,” Giffords said.
Giffords is the third film West and Cohen have produced about a female icon. Last year, they released “Julia,” a documentary about the influence of TV chef and author Julia Child. “RBG” was a commercial and critical success when it debuted four years ago. The filmmakers say that while Giffords and Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg, who died in 2020 aged 87, have very different personalities, they think viewers will see a lot of similarities. Both are resilient, resilient, optimistic, and at the heart of “feminist love stories.”
Giffords often has to remind people that she still has a voice even when speaking isn’t easy – whether it’s gun safety or other issues. She said she really feels the climate is different now but that people have to be patient because change is “slow”, and Washington, DC, “really slow”.
She plans to focus on making federalism tougher than fact-checking through her Gun Owners for Safety coalition. The bill passed by the Senate would only increase background checks for buyers between the ages of 18 and 20.
If there’s one message she wants viewers to take from the documentary, it’s “fight, fight, fight every day,” says Giffords.
