''Dreams from My Real Father: A Story of Reds and Deception'' is a 2012 American film by
Joel Gilbert. It presents his
conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources:
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that U.S. President
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
's biological father was
Frank Marshall Davis
Frank Marshall Davis (December 31, 1905 – July 26, 1987) was an American journalist, poet, political and labor movement activist, and businessman.
Davis began his career writing for African American newspapers in Chicago. He moved to Atlanta ...
, an American poet and labor activist in Chicago and Hawaii, rather than
Barack Obama Sr.
Barack Hussein Obama Sr. (; 18 June 1934 – 24 November 1982) was a Kenyan senior governmental economist and the father of Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States. He is a central figure of his son's memoir, '' Dreams from My Fa ...
The film claims that Davis, who had been a closet member of the
Communist Party USA
The Communist Party USA, officially the Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA), is a communist party in the United States which was established in 1919 after a split in the Socialist Party of America following the Russian Revo ...
, influenced Obama's ideology, a claim disputed by Obama biographer
David Remnick.
The title is derived from Obama's memoir about his early life, ''
Dreams from My Father'' (1995). Reviews of the film were generally negative, noting that Gilbert had not proved any of his allegations, and the film was described as a "pseudo-documentary" and in "bad taste".
Background
The film alleges that
Frank Marshall Davis
Frank Marshall Davis (December 31, 1905 – July 26, 1987) was an American journalist, poet, political and labor movement activist, and businessman.
Davis began his career writing for African American newspapers in Chicago. He moved to Atlanta ...
, an African-American journalist, poet and labor activist, met Obama's mother
Ann Dunham
Stanley Ann Dunham (November 29, 1942 – November 7, 1995) was an American anthropologist who specialized in the economic anthropology and rural development of Indonesia. She is the mother of Barack Obama, the 44th president of the Uni ...
through her father
Stanley Dunham. Filmmaker Gilbert claims that the senior Dunham was not a furniture salesman, but rather a
Central Intelligence Agency
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...
(CIA) agent tasked with monitoring communists in Hawaii.
His claim is unsupported. In his memoir, Obama had noted that his grandfather Stanley Dunham and Davis were friends in Hawaii, and both had grown up in Kansas.
Filmmaker Gilbert said the film was the result of two years of research. He claims he found nude and fetish photos of Obama's late mother Ann Dunham, which he says were taken in late 1960 by Davis in Davis' Hawaii home. Gilbert compared these to Dunham's high school pictures and says he found the similarity to be "obvious". ''
The Hollywood Reporter
''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...
'' said, "He did not use an expert, however, to support his finding."
Gilbert says that more than one million copies of his film were mailed to voters in Iowa, Ohio, Nevada, New Hampshire and Colorado prior to the
2012 United States presidential election
The 2012 United States presidential election was the 57th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 6, 2012. Incumbent Democratic President Barack Obama and his running mate, incumbent Vice President Joe Biden, were re-el ...
. He refused to disclose who funded the film's wide mailings. ''
The Daily Beast
''The Daily Beast'' is an American news website focused on politics, media, and pop culture. It was founded in 2008.
It has been characterized as a "high-end tabloid" by Noah Shachtman, the site's editor-in-chief from 2018 to 2021. In a 20 ...
'' reported that there was no way to verify the numbers claimed by Gilbert.
Reception
Critical reaction to the film was largely negative.
David Maraniss, author of ''
Barack Obama: The Story,'' described the film as "preposterous," saying that it is "depressing to have so much fictional, unreported, conspiratorial, unhistorical stuff floating around." Among anti-Obama productions, Maraniss said "This DVD is the worst of the bunch."
''
The Daily Beast
''The Daily Beast'' is an American news website focused on politics, media, and pop culture. It was founded in 2008.
It has been characterized as a "high-end tabloid" by Noah Shachtman, the site's editor-in-chief from 2018 to 2021. In a 20 ...
'' commentator
Michelle Goldberg
Michelle Goldberg (born 1975)"Michelle Goldberg". Contemporary Authors Online. Detroit: Gale, 2016. Retrieved via Biography in Context database, January 28, 2017. is an American journalist and author, and an op-ed columnist for ''The New York Tim ...
wrote, "It's tempting to ignore ''Dreams from My Real Father'' because it's so preposterous ... What matters here is not that a lone crank made a vulgar conspiracy video, one that outdoes even birther propaganda in its lunacy and bad taste. It's that the video is finding an audience on the right."
''
The Hollywood Reporter
''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...
'' stated that the film makes unsubstantiated allegations that President
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
lied about being the son of
Barack Obama Sr.
Barack Hussein Obama Sr. (; 18 June 1934 – 24 November 1982) was a Kenyan senior governmental economist and the father of Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States. He is a central figure of his son's memoir, '' Dreams from My Fa ...
, and quoted Steve Murphy, a Democratic consultant, who said, "It's about the lowest thing you can do to accuse, with no evidence, the opposition candidate's mother of being a porn star ... There are two motives behind this — racism and money. It's a cynical attempt to make some coin and exploit the views of the fringes of mainstream views."
''
Slate
Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...
'' said that the film "peddles a
conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources:
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so convoluted that more traditional birthers must be envious of its creativity".
Orly Taitz
Orly Taitz ( he, אורלי טייץ; born August 30, 1960) is an Israeli-American political conspiracy theorist and political candidate. A dentist, lawyer, and former real estate agent, Taitz was a figure in the "birther" movement, which promo ...
, who has said she believes that Obama was not born in the United States (the birther theory), disliked the film, as it claims Obama's father was an American, albeit a Communist. Neither allegation was supported.
Gilbert rejected this position: "... 'birthers' are barking up the wrong tree. It's not a question of where Obama was born — but rather, one of paternity."
Bill Armistead
Bill Armistead (born May 29, 1944) is an American politician from the state of Alabama. He served as the chairman of the Alabama Republican Party from 2011 to 2015. He served in the Alabama Senate from 1995 to 2003.
Early life and education
Bill A ...
, the chairman of the
Alabama Republican Party, called the film's theory "absolutely terrifying."
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
's estranged half-brother
Malik Obama
Abon'go Malik "Roy" Obama (born March 1958) is a Kenyan-American businessman and politician known for being the older half-brother of 44th president of the United States, Barack Obama, and the eldest son of economist Barack Obama Sr.
Biograph ...
gave an interview to Gilbert and expressed interest in his theory.
Debunking
Gilbert's claim that Obama's mother posed nude, allegedly by Davis, was proven false after blogger Loren Collins found that most of the photos Gilbert presented as evidence of his claim came from a magazine that ceased publication two years before Obama's mother arrived in Hawaii. Gilbert altered promotion of this claim on the website for his film in response to Collins' debunking, but he has never admitted his claim has been proven false or provided evidence to counter the debunking.
2014 Federal Election Commission complaint
In 2014 activist Loren Collins filed a complaint against Gilbert with the
Federal Election Commission, saying that the filmmaker was required to disclose his donors who financed the pre-election mailing of millions of unsolicited DVDs of the film to voters in several swing states. ''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' reported that in March 2016, the FEC, split evenly between Republican and Democratic members, ruled that Gilbert's DVD mailing was considered "press", and therefore not subject to donor disclosure as the mass-mailing could be argued to be a "marketing effort".
References
External links
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{{Conspiracy theories
2012 films
Mass media-related controversies in the United States
Political controversies in the United States
2012 documentary films
American independent films
American documentary films
Documentary films about conspiracy theories
Documentary films about American politics
Films about Barack Obama
Conspiracy theories regarding Barack Obama
2012 independent films
2010s English-language films
2010s American films