Former Massachusetts secretary of state and longtime seasonal Island visitor Michael Connolly will screen his new feature film, Unfinished Business, at Edgartown Cinemas on Tuesday, Sept. 16. at 7 p.m. Comedian Jimmy Tingle will perform a set beginning at 6:30 p.m., before the movie begins.

Unfinished Business traverses two time periods, present day when fictional politician Chick Muldoon is celebrating his 90th birthday on the Vineyard, and 1980s Boston, where a young reporter on the political beat is covering Mr. Muldoon’s career and the complicated maze of Massachusetts politics.

“What we wanted to do was create the classical David and Goliath situation, the story of brash innocence versus entrenched corruption,” Mr. Connolly said.

Placing the bulk of the story in the 1980s gives the film a period piece quality.

“It was an entirely different time,” Mr. Connolly said. “All communication was different. It’s a tale that’s told in a different time.”

Mr. Connolly spent more than 20 years serving in state government, with 15 of those years as the Massachusetts secretary of state. He used his real-life experiences as material for the film.

“This is a spiritual story, especially given the times that we live in right now,” he said. “This country has lost its way. I’ve never seen a culture where revenge and payback are so much in the forefront, instead of an era of forgiveness and patience and understanding.”

He first visited the Vineyard with his father in 1975. He said filming on the Island was both challenging but rewarding.

“You don’t have the level of control you would like, but you want as much control as you can get, and we managed to pull it off,” he said.

Mr. Connolly ends the film with a line from French philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.

“The way I end the film is with a quote: ‘We are not human beings having a spiritual experience, we are spiritual beings having a human experience.’ I hope that that’s not lost in the mix,” he said.

For more information, visit unfinishedbusiness.movie.