Rating: 
Summary: Taught political thriller/drama
Review: Thirteen Days is a movie in the vein of The Manchurian Candidate-the only difference being the ending is known from the beginning. Despite this, one is engrossed from the beginning and remains so throughout. It is not entirely accurate, but it is a movie, meant as entertainment, not a documentary. Read The Kennedy Tapes, transcripts of the tapes of Kennedy's conversations during the time with top advisers, if you want accuracy and detail. If you accept it as what it is, a superb piece of art, you will not be disappointed. It is stunning.
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Summary: Infinifilm: Not your Daddy's DVD
Review: Until today, the video diehards will be able to say they can do anything on VHS that you can do on DVD and, for most people, they'd be right. Nowadays, when you pop in your favorite DVD, you need to go searching through menus to find what you're really looking for. With the increasing amount of content packed on each disk, it can be a little bewildering even for a pro like myself (try finding the character animation studies on the Nightmare Before Christmas disc). It takes a dedicated geek to get the most out of every disc and most people won't even bother finding the deleted scenes, not to mention the 'Easter Eggs' that are now basically standard on every release. The other problem with this approach is that you see all of these little clips and notes out of context. These are the two prongs of the Infinifilm attack: exclusive features and ease of use.The new Infinifilm format (they could have chosen a better name) solves the first problem by providing relevant, contextual information right in the film itself. As you watch the Infinifilm version of the movie (and you can choose to watch the regular version as well) a transparent blue bar will pop up occasionally offering you one or two choices for extra features and the running time of each. It's so intuitive, it's scary. While previewing a copy of the upcoming 'Thirteen Days', this point was driven home when a menu popped up at the bottom of the screen offering me the chance to see how the White House exterior was created. After a very small clip that showed that the whole wing was really false, I was then put back in the film and saw the end product right on the screen! These menus offer a wealth of information in very small clips by accessing the documentaries on the disc and providing an immediate link to the relevant bits. It reminds me of the web links that come up in Frontline. This is exactly what computers were made for. The second difference on the Infinifilm discs that you will immediately notice are the question marks that seem to be placed on nearly every menu and selection. This is the new help system that New Line has come up with so that Aunt Irma doesn't have to miss 3/4 of the content. If she wants to know what Dolby Digital is, the question mark will tell her. Of course the old hands among us will mostly ignore those little offerings of assistance, but it's good to see that New Line has the customer squarely in mind here. The 'Thirteen Days' DVD is really the perfect initial offering, having so much source material to draw from. Not only will you see deleted scenes that show you how an entire subplot can be edited out, but you also get the special effects shots, cast and crew info and all the real historical information from the Cuban missile crisis. The included 48 minute documentary on the real event includes interviews from newsmakers and reporters, historical footage of the time and even many scenes talking with Nikita Khrushchev's son. You can watch it in pieces over the course of the film should you choose to access it all, or as a standalone feature. On initially hearing about Infinifilm, I thought it was just another marketing ploy that really wouldn't do anything new for me. After having seen it in action I can tell you that it will add a very real depth to the film that you just can't get by watching the content separately. That's the VHS way. Welcome to the modern world.
Rating: 
Summary: Here's another Hollywood movie which should not have never b
Review: "Thirteen Days" was marketed as a suspenseful, political thriller. How can it be suspenseful when we know the outcome? In the movie, the tense moments aren't really tense because we know everything is going to work out and nuclear war is going to be adverted. So the movie simply fails to be suspenseful. My biggest problem with the movie though, is that it's historical inaccurate. I'm not talking about something minor like this person never said that or this person never drank de-caff; the movie is supposed to give a behind the scenes look at the Cuban Missile Crises yet everything we see is pure fiction. "Thirteen Days" leads the audience to believe that the Kennedy's came to the rescue and saved the day. This couldn't be more false. In actuality, it was Kennedy's aids who saved the day. Whenever a situation arose, it was JFK's staff who figured out how to diffuse it. In fact, Kennedy often wanted to take the wrong course of action but his aids would help steer him to the right decisions. An Oliver Stone picture contains less lies. The direction and acting are also quite weak. The director, Roger Donaldson would often have a scene start in black and white and fade to color. When Oliver Stone does this, it works because there's actually a reason for it. Like in "Nixon", when the film was being told from press's view everything was in B&W, and when the perspective shifted to Nixon's, the film went to color. In "Thirteen Days" though, the use of this technique felt terribly out of place and was distracting. As for the acting, the support cast was good, but Kevin Costner was at his worst. He played the part as if he were a lost Kennedy brother with a speech impediment. This movie has no merits whatsoever. If you want to find out what really happened during the Cuban Missile Crises, the best thing to do is read a book.
Rating: 
Summary: 13 is an unlucky number
Review: Rarely has a movie been made that contains more embarassing gafes than this one. Though it proports to tell the true and unknown story of the Cuban Missile Crisis, the television movie, MISSILES OF OCTOBER did it much better and with a better cast. Had the producers sought to explain the Bay of Pigs crisis even with a "Star Wars"-type rolling introduction, the movie might have made more sense. Instead what we have is a mess in which the virtuous Kennedy Brothers overcome the evil machinations of the military. Wisely Kevin Costner does not play either Bobby or Jack, but attempts to portray Kenny O'Donnell whose duties involved a variety of domestic considerations. Unfortunately there is none of THAT in this movie. Kenny's sole duties appear to be to whistle a happy tune in times of stress at the Russian embassy. Meanwhile the evil military leaders attempt to start WWIII. They hate the Kennedys and storm through the White House clenching cigars and muttering about the Kennedys as though they were George McGovern presiding over the admission of gays into the military after slashing the Department of Defense budget. Since Bobby had the presence of mind to name one of his many children after one of these thugs in uniform, this can't be the way that this happened. Why is it that the producers of this movie sought to cover up the fact that in those days, doves did not inhabit the White House, nor could they hope to get elected. Kennedy did gleefully preside over one of the largest arms build ups in post-war history. But I guess in Hollywood's eyes, no one that attractive could ever be anything more than true blue. The producers did not understand the relationship between the executive and the military in so many ways, it would be tedious to go further. Another omission is the lack of anything on the Russians. The Cold War is over and there is so much material available to use. At least MISSILES OF OCTOBER included a few scenes with Khrushchev. The subject matter offered so much potential for a capable dramatist and able producers, it is a pity that this movie fails so completely on so many counts.
Rating:
Summary: A dramatic view for a new generation
Review: Being a teenager, I obviously never experienced the missle crisis. When watching this film at the local theater, I was moved by the urgency, and desperation of the crisis. Many Americans today do not have a realistic view on what it would be like to have a threat to the United States homeland. Not a foreign battle, in Arabia, or in Europe, but an actual battle on United States soil. The idea of this simply cannot be grasped by many. This movie, aside from its shortcomings in complete historical accuracy of the facts pertaining to the Cuban Missle Crisis, did provide an eye opening view of what could have happened. What could have turned into the first foreign attack on the United States mainland since the 1800's. For people of my generation, that did not live through the crisis, this movie is a must see.
Rating:
Summary: An Attempt... Falls short of the mark
Review: Kevin Costner stars in this over-dramatitized account of the Cuban missle crises during the 60's. The film basically encompasses the experiences of America's top leaders in the tense few days in which the United States was nearly brought to the brink of war between themselves and the Soviet Union. The acting is so "over-acted" that you can hardly focus on the events of the film without laughing about the character's reactions to the situations. All the actors totally fake accents are mind bogglingly annoying as you actually try to come to grips with the film. Costner's is the worst! Please, why don't they allow them to speak in a normal voice, it would help drastically. Besides that, this film was "okay", nothing extraordinary, and not too far below par, but it was missing a critical element called "interesting" that usually makes a good movie.
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Summary: A much-underrated film that history buffs will love to see!
Review: ...if you're a history buff or you just like to see well-made, well-acted dramas that resemble the political thrillers of the golden age of Hollywood, then "Thirteen Days" will be a delight. Kevin Costner, in his best role in years, plays Kenneth "Kenny" O'Donnell, a real-life aide to President Kennedy in the early sixties. The film starts up in October 1962, when a U-2 spy plane flying a routine mission over Cuba photographs the Cubans and their Russian allies secretly building missile launchers. These missile launchers could allow the Russians to launch a sneak attack on the USA (as with the Japanese at Pearl Harbor) with nuclear missiles, wiping out most of America's big cities before we even had a chance to respond. President Kennedy is furious at the Russian's dangerous actions and calls an emergency meeting of his cabinet, the Joint Chiefs, and his top aides, including his brother and alter ego, Bobby Kennedy, and Kenny O'Donnell. The group all agrees that the USA cannot allow the Russians to put nuclear missiles in Cuba, as it is a direct threat to our national security and will place the USA in a very vulnerable position. However, the group is strongly divided over how to get rid of the missiles - some of the more gung-ho military types want to either invade Cuba or at least launch a sneak attack with jet fighters to destroy the missiles; but other government officials (such as O'Donnell and Bobby Kennedy) are more cautious and want to find a more peaceful way to eliminate the missiles. From there the film steadily increases the tension and for awhile it does appear that the USA is going to invade Cuba and destroy the missiles, which would have started World War Three and a nuclear holocaust. Although it's true that "we know the outcome" - the missiles were taken out and we avoided a nuclear war - this film does dramatically show just how close we came to going the other way. Not until the night before the invasion of Cuba was scheduled to begin was an agreement reached which led to a more peaceful outcome. As I mentioned, Kevin Costner gives his best performance in years as O'Donnell (who died from cancer in the 1970's); and Bruce Greenwood, a little-known Canadian actor, gives what is easily the best potrayal of John F. Kennedy ever filmed. The actors playing Bobby Kennedy and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara are also excellent. The Cuban Missile Crisis remains the closest that the world has ever come to nuclear war, and hopefully it will be the closest we ever come. Although some people have criticized this film for showing the Kennedys in a too favorable light (and I'm no fan of the Kennedys) the Cuban Missile Crisis was undeniably their best moment in the White House, and President Kennedy's handling of the crisis earned him praise even from his critics. Hopefully, leaders in the future will show the same courage and good sense that JFK did if they are ever confronted by a similiar crisis. For a film that manages to be both faithful to the historical record and provide a tense, nailbiting thriller of a movie, "Thirteen Days" is about as good as it gets. A "must-see" for any history or political buff!
Rating: 
Summary: engaging but not entirely true
Review: This is a good film, but do not attempt to learn history from it. A very engaging drama greatly enhanced by excellent performance of main actors, it is definitely worth seeing. Unfortunately, serious mistakes and misinterpretation of historical facts make the film less valuable for long run. See for yourself if you like it. You can always get your money back!
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Summary: DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME!
Review: Please stay away from this over-hyped, lopsided skewering of history. It's pure Hollywood. This movie claims that the real drama lies with presidential aid Kenneth O'Donnell (Kevin Costner, in yet another forgettable role) and his nurse-maiding of the Kennedy boys through the pifalls of Cold War diplomacy. I don't think so. Take a look instead at 1974's "The Missiles of October," and watch William Devane (JFK) and Howard DaSilva (Kruschev) square off in a chilling chess match of nuclear proliferation. No hype. No distortion of facts. No cartoonish special effects to jar you back to consciousness from bland dialogue, spoken blandly. Just good, accurate drama.
Rating:
Summary: Brings the crisis home
Review: This movie really brings the crisis home. You can feel yourself urging the President to , stay the course, and don't invade. It's as if it is unfolding in front of you, and not history. Five Stars. Excellent!!
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