When it comes to politicians showing courage, the bar has been on the floor over the last decade. In a system where confrontation is rewarded over competence or cooperation, it’s a rare thing to see leaders putting their ideals to the test, especially if it costs them their elected position. Leave it then to Steve Pink, the director behind the sublime Hot Tub Time Machine and scribe of Cusackian masterpieces, Grosse Pointe Blank and High Fidelity, to tell the story of former congressman Adam Kinzinger in The Last Republican with the breeziness of a comic book film and the impact of a deep journalistic dive. The epithetic irony of his last name – Pink’s politics lay quite left of center – makes for a perfect dynamic duo of differing ideologies, coming together to tell this unique, powerful, and sometimes ridiculous story of contemporary America.

What Is ‘The Last Republican’ About?
Image Via Media Courthouse Documentary Collective

Adam Kinzinger is a politician you can spot a mile away; with his close-cropped hair, strong jawline, and straight-edged demeanor, he’d look right at home in the Oval Office in a Roland Emmerich disaster movie. His beliefs lean hard right. He voted for Trump’s agenda nearly every time, he worships the Reagan revolution, and has views on freedom of choice, gun control and the like that would make most lefties in Hollywood dismiss him outright. Yet, in one central way, he isn’t like most Republican politicians. When his country called to account for what happened on January 6, 2020, when a mob of individuals riled up by Trump descended upon the capitol in order to disrupt the peaceful transition of power, Kinzinger joined a small group of fellow Republicans that voted for the impeachment of the leader of their party, eschewing blind loyalty to the GOP in an attempt to ensure this catastrophic event would never be tolerated again.

The documentary is less a story about the events we already know and more an insight into how Kinzinger reflects on how these decisions resulted in him being kicked out from office, and forced to flee a party that he’s been a part of since he was a young teen covering his walls with campaign signs instead of posters of rock stars or models. The film ties this desire to act with his decision to join the military in 2003 — driven by the events following 9/11 — and serving both in the Air Force and the Air National Guard until 2019. But it also shows how it came from an incident where he intervened to protect a woman during a knife attack, saving her life and in the process putting himself in harm’s way. It was the first time, as he reflects, that he knew that to do the right thing may have a cost.

All heavy stuff, to be sure, but Pink’s gift here is not letting these stories play out as campaign ads or hagiographic aggrandizement, refusing to simply be a checkbox list of his accomplishments. Instead, the film interrogates Kinzinger’s passions and politics in a far more robust way, resulting in appreciating the moments where this guy actually did the right thing at the right moment freed from his ideological bent. That’s not to say there isn’t jibing. It’s clear the two are agreeable in their disagreements, and the dynamic between the subject in a cleared-out office at the end of his congressional term and the off-screen sardonicism of his interlocutor is but one of the film’s most astute and entertaining elements.

Adam Kinzinger’s Story Is Bigger Than Politics
Image via TIFF

Even for political junkies who have followed every moment of the events surrounding January 6th, there are surprising nuggets revealed. One of the most shocking is that the ever-wily Nancy Pelosi essentially publicly invited Kinzinger to be on the congressional committee via an interview she conducted on television before she asked him first, calling him very early the next morning to make things official. If the last month or so as of writing this review has proven anything, it’s that the machinations of Pelosi’s politics are laudable no matter one’s tribal association, and frankly exhibit exactly the kind of cold calculus that may have saved Kinzinger’s career, if slightly sullied his soul.

This brings us to the most remarkable thing: the odd feeling you get watching such a documentary, given the fact that this is very much, as of this date, an unfolding story. As of writing, the specter of another Trump presidency is still hurtling towards Earth like an asteroid in one of those films Kinzinger would be right at home in as the overworked but heroic President. Screening this film a day before the former congressman appeared at the Democratic convention to speak about voting for Harris and Walz over the former president because, rather than despite his Republican ideals, was more than a bit surreal.

This makes The Last Republican not only timely but also a bit more profound than merely another political portrait. Yes, it’s about engaging in discourse, in being agreeably disagreeable. But it’s also an antidote to the siloed system that media, be it social or corporate or local, has fostered, providing a genuine discussion between individuals of opposed politics that still have respect enough to engage in the endeavor. The film provides a deep examination of duty but also a vitally important capturing of a particular place and time in the American story. A post-credit jibe about the film serving as a platform for an eventual presidential run is only half made in jest, given the near impossibility from our perspective that Kinzinger’s party could swing back towards what he feels to be its conservative center. Still, it also admits to the “never say never” mantra of many a former representative who weathers the storm only to make a bold return.

Whatever his future holds, it seems impossible from today’s perspective to consider Kinzinger returning to his party without abandoning the nature of his character that led him in this case to stand up to tyranny. Perhaps, if history is kind, he’ll even find success in the cabinet of an incoming Democratic president, playing the role of a rational conservative voice that’s cooperative rather than contrarian. Or maybe he’ll simply be part of the pundit class, commenting instead of legislating, pontificating instead of politicking. Only time will tell.

Steve Pink’s Documentary Is Entertaining, Informative, and Enlightening

More than simply a screed, the film is also highly entertaining, sculpted with precision by Pink and his collaborators, shot with the gloss of a campaign ad but with the droll comedic ebullience of his feature films. Politics always has an aspect of showmanship, of course, but here in an age where carefully curated clips of camera footage are required to represent the events of January 6 where months of procedural work were overlooked, the image is the thing, and the film very much leans into this fact.

The film serves either as the end of Kinzinger’s political life or merely a pause before a new beginning. He reflects on how things could have been different, how that small assembly of Republicans could have taken the moral high ground more forcefully. Even more critically, it looks at how they could’ve used the disgust that the nation felt to redirect the funds that truly drive politics away from the MAGA horde and towards the adults in the room. This was a major misstep, a lack of imagination that didn’t anticipate speaker Kevin McCarthy going down to Mar-a-Lago to bend the knee to Trump mere weeks later, consolidating, once again, the party around their flawed but popular candidate. It’s in this telling that some actual bitterness is evident, a brief flash beyond the general anger about those that disappointed Kinzinger to this moment where he disappointed himself, a true “what could have been” question that lays heavily in the air. Yet even the successes, from the committee work to standing up for his beliefs or even that altercation that helped save a woman’s life, aren’t presented as mere triumphalism, but also as a kind of tragedy.

This is the story of one who stood up, with all his faults and flaws, one whose ideology you may not agree with, but whose capacity to show justifiable rage speaks for those too cowardly to act. It’s here that Pink’s film derives its most impressive impact, and while few may mourn for The Last Republican as both the nation and the world race toward a chaotic, uncertain future, the end result is easily one of the best docs of the year. In time, it may become even more resonant about a changing political landscape than it already is. There are lessons to be learned in The Last Republican. It’s a tale of a cape-less man who may not rise to Homeric levels of heroism but still shows someone who raised his hand when duty called, even at the expense of his own position. Who among us can be certain we would do the same, regardless of whatever side of the political spectrum we are comfortable to call home?

The Last Republican had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.