A documentary a little behind its time and a movie like the most boring reality show of all time

Caucus, a new documentary in the acknowledged tradition of Maysels, Pennebaker, et al., is a hand-held camera view of the 2012 Iowa Republican caucus, with no editorial intrusions other than some still highlights of headlines and passages in news reports over the course of the primary campaign. There's a wide swath of material to cover and the team does a good job keeping a sense of narrative coherency. It seems so long ago - when there were many potential Republican challengers to Obama and the polls veered wildly from day to day, with as many as six or seven Republican aspirants leading in the poll at one time or another. And now who can even remember who won the Iowa primary? (It was Santorum, by a few votes over Romney.) And doesn't the Romney campaign seem like a generation ago, not just two years? So much has changed, especially since the devastation of the mid-terms; this documentary seems, sadly, to have waited till its moment was past. The surprise to me was the Santorum came off as the most winning personality in the entire field - you could almost imagine voting for him, until he gets onto some of the issues. But at least he was open and straightforward about his goals and beliefs. Most of the others were without a prayer (Pawlenty) or fringy, even for Republicans (Paul). The scarier alternatives were Bachman and Perry - who over time were exposed as shallow, sloganeering frauds - Gingrich, who is obviously intelligent but devious and mean - and Cain, who was exposed as morally corrupt and incompetent (a businessman to save our country? really? businesses are run so effectively?). That leaves Romney - who was possibly the most palatable in this frightening array, and I'll give him this at least: he said what he believed; he was able to stand before a group of the elderly asking about Social Security raises and telling them no, he couldn't promise that. One of the clips shows his famous "corporations are people, too, my friend" - and that pretty much sums up the Romney campaign: He cannot related to people; everything about him was abstract. And even Republicans soon realized that his view, though well expressed, were shallow: He was right about health care - until he was wrong. Also watched the first 40 minutes of Archipelago, a British film from 2010 about a family on vacation on some British island waiting for father's arrival and preparing to send off 20-something son to Africa; quite well acted, in that the entire 40 minutes seemed unscripted and like a reality show - but the most boring reality show in the history of TV or cinema. Maybe this movie was deep and subtle, but nothing in the first 40 minutes grabbed my sympathy or interest, and another hour was too much to give.