JFK

Rating:
Summary: An eye-opener
Review: Well, where do I begin? Oliver Stone received much flak for making this movie from critics. He was called every name in the book by those who firmly believed in the government's official line of crap as to who shot President Kennedy. I saw the movie and instantly was hooked. I ran out and bought books on the subject (both pro-conspiracy and anti-conspiracy) and was amazed. Check this movie out, even if you subscribe to the government's theory of Oswald the crazed lone gunman. You will be riveted by Stone's movie-making abilities, trust me!

Rating:
Summary: A history making documentary.
Review: JFK is a documentary of historical fact. Without going into too much detail, Kevin Costner plays the part of Jim Garrison, proving again that he can act better when he's not directing. Donald Sutherland is brilliant, albeit his one scene (10 min.) If you follow the camera and angles, it looks as if the scene was shot in one take. Given Oliver Stone's penchant for details and cinema verité perfectly, it probably was.

When the movie is over, you have this feeling that JFK was assassinated in a conspiracy, as opposed to the Warren Commission's report of a single bullet theory. In the end, you'll be thinking twice about whodunit! END

Rating:
Summary: One of the best films in history!
Review: This movie has come under alot of controversy. But it is based in fact! No movie that I can think of even comes close to comparing with JFK. John Williams composed a EXCELLENT soundtrack. Oliver Stone masterfully and brillantly directed this fim. And an all-star cast of: Kevin Costner, Tommy Lee Jones, Kevin Bacon, John Candy, Sissy Spacek, Joe Pesci, and Gary Oldham. (watch for a cameo apperance of Jim Garrison as "Earl Warren" EXCELLENT MOVIE!! REALLY MAKES YOU THINK.... END

Rating:
Summary: In dark times, the eye begins to see
Review: I am a student of film, and scriptwriting. I've learned about lighting, budget cost, directing, and scriptwriting. I've even written scripts that are set in history. Ya go in cocky thinkin', yeah, I'll make this movie so historically accurate, everthing will be precise down to the very minute! But after printing out eight pounds of paper on every small detail, you start to realise that nobody, and I mean nobody can make a decent historically accurate film without losing your mind!

I've very carefully researched the assasination and I came across a very professional web site. Other web sites are very passonate, but this one was very by-the-book: something like "I believe this, but not that, and here's twelve pages of info showing why," kind of thing. I E-mailed him and asked what he thought of Oliver Stone's JFK; he said he'd give it a C+. Based on my troubles, that's really good!

I have to make this clear: JFK is ENTERTAINMENT based on fact. Making a good story is hard enough, but researching facts to back it up is going to tear apart your brain!
Do we have to spell it out for you people! The film encourages you to YOUR OWN RESEARCH. Donald Sutherland even says it in the film: "But don't trust me; do your own work, your own thinking." Their are people out their that think they're so smart saying, "oh look, that didn't happen in real life; I guess the movie is garbage, then." I've seen it with "JFK", with "The Passion of the Christ", and even the fictional, "Lord of the Rings."

"Oh, the bullet that hit Kennedy was a tumbling bullet and that's why the bullet looks so perfect," they say. Let me ask you something: have you ever seen a tumbling bullet? They're flat, flat as a pancake. As if a steam roller went over it. And this bullet supposedly went through several bones. For all we know the bullet was squished AFTER it was collected (just a little, so no one will notice. Shhhh). I bet you skeptics don't know what frame of the Z-film the "magic bullet" hit the president? What's the name of the document stating the withdrawl of ALL U.S. troops from Vietnam by 1965? What mafia kingfish did Johnny Roselli have conections with? Do you even know who Johnny Roselli is? What about Beverly Oliver? Jim Marrs? James Tague? Perry Russo? What velocity was Oswald's rifle? WHAT WAS Oswald's rifle? Where did he buy it? Who's James Files?

This film is about judging for yourself. Check it out on the internet, buy a book, then buy the other guy's book and compair.

The more I think of the supression of this subject by the media today, the more I realise that this is not a 40 year old subject. It's here, it's now! It's in the TV! It's in the walls! It's on the radio! It's out the window! It's in the newspapers! It's just a question of who's willing to see it. Keven Costner said it best "Don't you think THIS, has something to do with THAT! CAN'T YOU SEE!"

Who cares that there were no women on Jim Garrison's legal team (unlike in the movie). Who cares that Garrison never called Clay Shaw a liar right to his face(dramatic licence). Who cares that Garrison's closing statement was a composite of the speech he DID GIVE, lines in his book, and Stone's own additions(proper pacing of a story). That little stuff doesn't matter!

The Warren Commision is a myth, and Oliver Stone's JFK is anti-myth.

Rating:
Summary: Shocking and thought provoking
Review: Okay, I have a little trouble with the swearing but guess people can ignore it or get a blocker. That said, this was an outstanding movie and really made you think about the unthinkable. There are coverups that most of us have no clue about.The higher ups regardless of what people may think pull many strings to get done what they want done. Those we have always sought to trust can also be the ones who betray us. War is money and I am convinced, that the murder of JFK was a well orchestrated event. Buy the DVD with the accompaining documentary. It amazes me how some people refuse to believe it. BELIEVE IT. I love America but we are no saints here. Money and power is always a driving force. Don't ever think it can't happen here. Kevin Costner gives a brilliant performance and the impassioned speech in court toward the end of the movie that he gave portraying Jim Garrison drew me in like nothing I have ever heard. Watch "Thirteen Days" first than this one and rethink the situation and see what you come up with.

Rating:
Summary: Scary
Review: Oliver Stone's Director's Cut DVD has an extra seventeen minutes of footage added. This adds to the general suspense of the movie. JFK starts off very slow, like a History Channel documentary, and you think "Bo-ring!" But suddenly, in the whirlwind of dizzying camera shots and angles, you realize you are witnessing dark and distorted history being unearthed. By then you are so deep in, it is impossible to get out.

Kevin Costner is brilliant as New Orleans D.A. William Garrison, the man who brought the only public trial to this date on the JFK assassination. A string of brilliant and well-known actors complement the film. Joe Pesci, Donald Sutherland, Kevin Bacon, Sissy Spacek, John Candy, Ed Asner, Jack Lemmon, and Tommy Lee Jones give the movie so much credibility because their performances are simply so believable, and way out of the usual roles they play. In fact, this whole film represents a role the U.S. player that is far, far out of the role we usually play.

The score by John Williams alternately scares the beejesus out of you, or galvanizes you to action.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating, but it's really Garrison's trip
Review: It's a great and fascinating film, but Stone should have framed it up more as a trip into one man (Jim Garrison's) mind rather than what it becomes: an authoritative litany of supposedly factual evidence. Subtlety and understatement are _not_ this film's strong suites. You start detecting a relentless one-sidedness that could have been alleviated by presenting both sides of the coin.. for instance, many people went on record as hearing more than 3 shots fired, some from the direction of the rail yard, but couldn't someone quip "with all the tall buildings in Dealy Plaza, there must have been lots of echoes and accoustical artifacts". Or when Sutherland relates that the D.C. phone system went dead for an hour immediately after the shooting he could have added ".. or maybe this was just from a sudden overload of calls, I don't know".

This picture is still visually and technically remarkable although some techniques, such as the unsteady slo-mo with tracer effect have been mimicked and made passe by reality TV. Casting was great but more true-blue southerners in some of the high profile roles (esp. Garrison) would have been good, for more authenticity in accents and chemistry of interaction.

After first seeing "JFK" in 1991 I remember feelings of outrage and that my eyes had been opened to the way "things really are". The second time around, I did notice in the opening credits that the film is based on a couple of books, one by Garrison, and this clued me in to the fact that this film is a journey into Garrison's world, however monomaniacal and obsessionist it may be. Stone should have taken more opportunites to make this distinction clear.

What sticks with me after viewing "JFK" this time around, is the laughable lack of security for the Dallas motorcade, then after the shots were fired the cascade of chaos, human error, and implausible coincidence. A lot of Garrison's theorizing and Mr. X's monologue seem obsessionist and half-baked (kind of like those intense conversations from your pot-head days that seemed so profound at the time but then incoherent when you think back later).

My money is on this scenario: that the assassination was planned and done by a motley fringe group of individuals including Oswald, who had ties to rightist Cuban exiles and indirectly to low-level CIA; that the shots went crack, crack, crackBANG with the 4th shot coming from the rail yard; that the behavior at Parklawn, Bethedsa, and by LBJ and the Warren Commission was not an orchestrated coverup but independent reactions of officials who saw red flags and inconsistencies but felt, in the heat of the moment, that the whole episode had to be put behind as quickly and cleanly as possible to avoid a descent into a national state of anarchy. From our comfortable, relatively stable vantage point in the year 2005 this seems like about the worst thing they could have done, but I guess you had to have been there.

Rating:
Summary: Was there a conspiracy? Well there was...
Review: The Warren Report is the basic starting point for anybody who is even remotely interested in researching the JFK assassination. The book is massive - nearly 2 inches thick, 9 inches in length and 6 inches in width and clocks in at 888 pages. There are many illustrations and photographs to help break the monotony and they are helpful in understanding the text.

Be forewarned. This report is not to be taken at face value. It promotes itself while at the same time laying blame on everybody from Oswald to the Secret Service and the Dallas County Police. The movie JFK is critical of this book's findings, because of its omissions. This is what the movie JFK hopes to explore.

The warren commission report starts with its summary and conclusions - that Oswald acted alone in killing President Kennedy and that there was no conspiracy. It then gives a brief synopsis of the assassination and the circumstances surrounding the events on November 22nd 1963. We see these in the movie. The report continues by developing the scenario in the Texas School Book Depository including the evidence gained from witnesses at the scene and the recovery of the riffle, spent shells and prints. Connections are established between Oswald and the riffle and the School Book Depository building before moving on to the motive and Oswald's background, Oswald's detention, the media, Oswald's murder and his assassin - Jack Ruby. The film is mostly about dealing with investigating a possible conspiracy, challenging the Warren report in-depth with expert witness testimony, with the big court room showdown that in the end leaves you feeling that Oswald did not do it.

Great movie, through and through. Hard not to love it. Why only 4 stars?

Oswald was involved in the slaying of Officer J.D Tippit and this is a clincher. The murder of patrolman Tippit is a key event which shows that Oswald was capable of murder and was also on a killing frenzy at the time of the assassination. The movie really does bend the reality of this problem by saying that it was a number of agents pretending to be Oswald.

He also tried to shoot officers when he was apprehended in the film theatre. Did Oswald shoot President Kennedy? Probably Yes. Could the Magic bullet theory work? It is possible. Did Jack Ruby kill Oswald on the spur of the moment? The facts surrounding this are vague. Did Oswald act alone? It is possible but unlikely. Does the Warren report do justice for the American people and the people of the world? Absolutely not. Does the Warren report deliberately neglect important and relevant information? Absolutely. Would an impartial jury convict Oswald on the assassination of President Kennedy based on the evidence? Probably not because there is too much doubt at large to deal with. Would an impartial jury convict Oswald of the murder J.D Tippit? Yes. Is there a cover-up and if so why?

The truth is that there is probably a cover-up involved and the Warren report as it stands today is absolute proof that the US government at the time was knee-deep in a conspiracy of some kind simply based on its omissions and neglect to deal with highly important and relevant evidence. Was there a government conspiracy to assassinate the President? Probably not, but there was a cover-up of a conspiracy of some kind and this is what is at the heart of the whole assassination and the follow up events including this report. A blind eye has probably been turned to the truth surrounding the assassination because President Kennedy was considered an obstacle to many important people. In fact the Warren Commission report has all the hallmarks of a new administration that just wants to sweep everything under the carpet.

But in closing I will say this. Go try the real world simulation run of JFKreloaded and you will see that it might be possible to actually reproduce the magic bullet. You can actually hit the President 3 times no problem, including the fatal headshot. Oswald could have done it. The simulation clearly shows that you can do it also.

Rating:
Summary: "JFK:" A CASE FOR CONSPIRACY!
Review: Before I go into the film's speculations on the assassination of John F. Kennedy, I'll first review the film. It is a powerful film that is filled with intriguing characters played by an exceptional cast. The storyline fills the plot out rather nicely, and the courtroom scenes are intense and emotionally-charged.

Now to the theories the film presents. The Zapruder film makes it plainly obvious that the shot that killed Kennedy did NOT come from the Book Depository, but from the Grassy Knoll. The questions surrounding the assassination, and the questions about a possible cover-up, are presented quite well in this film. The film also presents a theory that is scary to contemplate, but still feasible: the only successful coup d'etat on American soil. The evidence for the conspiracy theories are presented accurately and faithfully.

The only segments I disagree with are the theories about Oswald. I still believe he fired shots from the Depository, and two of the bullets he fired hit Kennedy, but I do believe that he became the scapegoat for the conspiracy plot. Other than this little blunder, the rest of the case is presented real well in the film.

The bonus DVD features an exceptional documentary that goes beyond the film to discuss the many theories surrounding their deaths, as well as an interview with Fletcher Prouty. The deleted scenes present little good, and are a weak part of the second disc. But the doc makes up for it.

Overall, "JFK" isn't as good as Oliver Stone's most recent film. the epic "Alexander," but it is a solid film that is fascinating in it's own right. Even if you don't believe that the assassination of President John F. Kennedy was part of a coup d'etat, you will still come out believing that Oswald didn't act alone!

Movie/DVD Grade: A-

Rating:
Summary: Film & Propaganda
Review: According to an ABC poll conducted 40 years after the assassination, 70% of the American people believes it was a conspiracy. Stone's "JFK" has something to do with that, although probably not as much as some historical critics contend. Viewing it again on the 41st commemoration brought back a good deal of the deep grief those who of us who lived through it felt. "JFK" clearly deserved the place it received in the Oscar pantheon for technical achievement. More than anything, however, the film now brings to my mind at least, the propaganda of the famous Nazi-era director, Leni Riefenstahl, who died recently ("Triumph of the Will"; "Olympia") -- and for the pure technical brilliance of her period, Stone's equal. Many respected highly placed Americans (Lindbergh comes to mind) were America First advocates who believed fascism was the wave of the future, until December 7, 1941 (or did FDR allow that to happen to get us into WWII?), surely partly on the strength of Nazi propaganda masquerading as truth, including Riefenstahl's.

Stone is no crypto fascist. But neither is he an historian, and his work should not be solely evaluated in that light. Unfortunately, he chose to take history-cum-Hollywood to the limit: a specific, world shaking historical event upon which he neatly imposes just about every conspiracy theory out there -- summed up by Sutherland's monologue, which Stone deliberately stretches to an incredible length, spoken as rapidly as those broadcast disclaimers, and intercut with faux stock film to prop it up. Listen carefully to that monologue or get the script and read it sometime. It's incoherent, unbelievable, laughable babble. On film, Sutherland being the actor he is, brings it off. And Stone being the director he is, brings the whole enchilada off.

This conspiracy sophistry will last as long as there are conspiracy-peddlers, who will always be kept in business by an America steeped in conspiracy paranoia. Not that there isn't a lot to be paranoid about: after all, 9/11 is fast becoming a new conspiracy mania (but without the expertise of a Stone behind it yet); Arafat did die mysteriously; they're still counting Kerry votes in Ohio; Bush II was very suspiciously first elected by precisely 1 electoral vote more than he needed in a state where his own brother, by gosh, was the sitting governor; and so on. So it's up to those of us who love great and near-great film (which "JFK" is) to also speak to the voluminous evidence demonstrating no conspiracy, a job already admirably performed by all the networks (except the History Channel), many pundits, exhaustively researched books, and public reviewers on this very page. Placing the film in full context would also show Kennedy's life was far more important than lame conspiracy theories: Dallek's "An Unfinished Life" is a great place to start; and on the assassination itself, try Posner's concise "Case Closed". Relying solely on Stone or any director, no matter how brilliant, for historical truth is downright dangerous. But, with those caveats (and the admonishments of Santayana and Heisenberg) in mind, by all means see and/or buy this film.