The messy business of modern elections

The Presidential Election is just four months away. It’s worth remembering that in 2004, democracy wasn’t always timely.

Democracy is messy business and few places illustrate that better than the polls. On November 2, 2004, director Katy Chevigny set out to capture a cross-section of American voters, in hopes of moving beyond the horse race and red-state–blue-state debates. The result is her documentary, "Election Day," which focuses on 11 American stories and locales, where Chevigny’s team shot simultaneously from dawn into midnight.

Chevigny says the issues and problems she captured four years ago are even more relevant today — the sources of problems are still there: " … people are going to have problems going to polls in 2008 in lots of locations for sure."

The director also says that some of the most "egregious" footage in the documentary show real disparities in the polls, including comparisons between polls in poor neighborhoods and rich neighborhoods, ease and difficulty of access to the polls, and lots of human errors.

Chevigny goes further to say that things could actually be worse in 2008 due to the high voter turn-out predicted for this Presidential Election.

"Election Day" airs July 1 on PBS on P.O.V.

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