Cinema Verite tells the behind-the-scenes story of the groundbreaking documentary “An American Family,” which chronicled the lives of a Santa Barbara family, the Louds, in the early 1970s, catapulting them to notoriety while creating a new television genre: reality TV. The film dramatises the genesis of the series, as Pat and Bill Loud (Diane Lane and Tim Robbins) are approached by filmmaker Craig Gilbert (James Gandolfini) and agree to have cameras follow their family in and around their home in Santa Barbara.