KLRU, The Austin Chronicle, and South by Southwest have teamed up for SXSW Presents, an independent film series airing Fridays at 10pm on Channel 18 (Time Warner Cable Channel 9). Hosted and co-produced by SXSW Film producer Matt Dentler, the second season of the series runs through Dec. 2. This week’s installment is See How They Run, about which, when it screened at the festival in 2002, former Senior Editor Clay Smith wrote, “Two weeks before election day in 1999, Tom Ammiano, a stand-up comedian and gay president of San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors, decided he would run for mayor against Willie Brown, the black incumbent. Brown may be pro-gay (or at least professes to be: At one campaign stop, he goes along with supporters who claim he is the “king” of San Francisco who can’t allow a “queen” to take over), but his inability to curb skyrocketing rents and encroaching gentrification are liabilities that Ammiano exploits to a surprisingly effective degree, given the short span of his campaign. Morse, who is a former Brown campaign worker, follows the sometimes outrageous race and run-off with aplomb and tenacity. Like all good political documentaries, See How They Run doesn’t take the politics-as-sport approach, and comments cogently on the city in the process.” For more information, see www.sxsw.com and www.klru.org.
This article appears in November 11 • 2005.