A political theme ran through this year’s Sarasota Film Festival extending to its yearly event Cinema Tropicale redubbed Cinema Politicale. At the huge bash at Michael’s on East, a near naked man wore stars and stripes body paint in red, white, and blue. Guests included Matthew Modine, represented at the festival with a screening of Full Metal Jacket, Stanley Kubrick’s 1987 war movie that registers anti-war. At a resonant panel, three shorts Modine conceived screened, all revealing his deeply felt philosophy. One was made after 9/11. He interviewed people in Washington Square Park to show what America looks like in all its diversity. He’s also a producer and narrator of the documentary The Brainwashing of my Dad. Director Jen Senko traces the transformation of America through talk radio and the advent of meanness through her father who was, in her youth, a devoted John F. Kennedy democrat. Noting his profound change, the documentary features Rush Limbaugh stoking fear and racism through calculated mistruths. The movie goes far to show how we got to where we are.