STACK #158 Dec 2017

JFK on FILM 2017 marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of late US President John F. Kennedy, and 54 years since his assassination in Dallas, Texas. Why does his legend endure? US President Donald Trump recently cleared the release of hundreds of previously restricted documents relating to Kennedy’s murder. Predictably, none have thrown new light on whether Lee Harvey Oswald – the man arrested for the crime, but murdered before a trial – was solely responsible, or part of a wider conspiracy. Perhaps more pertinently, over 50 years later, a solid motive for JFK’s assassination remains in the realm of speculation. The unanswered questions perhaps address the ongoing mystique around Kennedy, a man whose tenure in the White House briefly re-shaped America’s destiny. Words Jonathan Alley

DVD&BD FEATURE

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JFK on The Screen

further civil rights turmoil, and the later ennui of post-sixties America. THIRTEEN DAYS (2000) Australian ex-pat Roger Donaldson cast Kennedy (Bruce Greenwood) as the peacemaker, diplomat extraordinaire, and statesman-with-balls-of-steel in Thirteen Days . A man thrust in the glaring spotlight of history, who heroically stared down Fidel Castro and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, as nuclear weapons are aimed at the US from neighbouring Cuba.

The Kennedys

the family golden boy who rises the highest, and falls the hardest. THE ZAPRUDER FILM (1963) Perhaps the most important film about Kennedy is the shortest. On November 22, 1963, businessman Abraham Zapruder unintentionally captured Kennedy’s death at Dealey Plaza, Dallas, on 26 seconds of 8mm film. Viewing the slow- motion version on YouTube is disquieting: the footage raises more questions than it can ever conclusively answer. Did the fatal shot come from in front of Kennedy, not behind? Can that really be a ricochet? Did Lee Harvey Oswald reload and fire three rounds in 4.5 seconds? Were there more than three shots? Like Kennedy’s own enduring charisma and mystique, the intrigue surrounding the most infamous political murder of them all will likely live on.

Kennedy

KENNEDY (1983) This five-part mini-series (a UK/US co-production), while inevitably dated, is a dynamic and basically faithful depiction of Kennedy’s character and the events of his presidency, if historically by-the-numbers. Martin Sheen’s top work lies elsewhere, but his portrayal of JFK is nonetheless highly watchable. JFK (1991)

prove a wider conspiracy was behind the President’s assassination – has been widely dismissed by JFK scholars for playing fast and loose with speculation around the involvement of accused (and swiftly acquitted) businessman Clay Shaw as part of a labyrinthine conspiracy. And, despite deservedly acclaimed

Thirteen Days

THE KENNEDYS (2011) Despite the remaining clan’s strong reservations about having several square miles of dirty laundry aired on screens internationally in this mini- series, this piece of Kennedy- family mythbusting stands up in places, with Greg Kinnear surprisingly watchable as JFK,

turns from Kevin Costner (as Garrison) and Donald

Sutherland (as the clumsily monikered ‘X), the film romanticises the death

Oliver Stone’s cracking drama – depicting real life DA Jim Garrison’s attempt to

of the Kennedy dream – the ideal of a ‘new Camelot’ unhindered

by the encroaching reality of Vietnam,

The Zapruder Film

JFK

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DECEMBER 2017

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