JFK

JFK (Oliver Stone, 1991) 

 

"To sin by silence when we should protest makes cowards of men."

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

 

At the time of this film's release, Stone's movie-collage of Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories was more than controversial, it was inflammatory. Experts in "the field" criticized it for playing fast and loose with facts and some went so far as to call it dangerous in its implications. There was so much flummery going on, some of which contradicted other speculations of the film, that it was considered a new form of propaganda, where new possibilities popped up before previous assertions were followed up on, that one was simply overwhelmed with the slew of speculations so that, finally, nothing was ever concluded. There were no answers, merely a mountain of questions, all of them vague and unsubstantiated. Stone was merely throwing stuff up at the screen and seeing if anything stuck.

Stone answered these charges by saying that he was making a new kind of film, and that he was trying to build a new narrative for the Kennedy assassination, not provide a definitive answer, but to ask questions, merely. The evidence of film bears it out—at least at first glance—as it's so filled with theories and goes down so many rabbit-holes, unchecked and unverified (Stone has stated he was using the films Rashomon and Z as his models). But, one only has to see how Stone starts the movie to know where he thinks the center of the conspiracy lies. After that quote by author and spiritualist Ella Wheeler Wilcox, he introduces Kennedy's predecessor, Dwight Eisenhower's final address as President, in which he warns of "the military-industrial complex". Like so many openings of so many movies, it is the director's thesis statement, providing that one bit of detail before launching into a history of Kennedy's recent history (narrated by Martin Sheen, who has played both John and Robert Kennedy in the past).

"I'm ashamed to be an American today."

The film proper begins the day of Kennedy's assassination as New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner, who had, in 1998's Bull Durham, delivered a speech in which his character states "I believe that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.") sees the assassination coverage on television initially in his office, then watches mournfully from a nearby bar where the local booze-hounds are free to weep in their beers or grunt their approval of the President's death. At the same point he cuts away to an argument between two men in the bar, New Orleans private detective Guy Bannister (Edward Asner) and an operative Jack Wheeler (Jack Lemmon),* which leads to a fight in Bannister's office when Martin brings up past suspicious activity. Meanwhile, Garrison starts looking into local links to the assassination and brings in pilot David Ferrie (Joe Pesci), who might have had links with Oswald. And despite Ferrie being sketchy and giving conflicting stories, they let him go.

"It's all broken down, spread around, you read it and the point gets lost."

It is only after the Warren Commission Report on the assassination is released that Garrison picks up the threads of the case again. A chance airplane encounter with a Senator (Walter Matthau), whose skepticism —"That dog don't hunt!"—about the report sparks Garrison to again call in Ferrie, but also Martin, who had seen Lee Harvey Oswald in Bannister's office and follow up leads not explored after the initial inquiry was dropped. One name keeps popping up—"Clay Bertrand" but nobody knows who that is. Turns out that "Bertrand" is an alias of Clay Shaw (Tommy Lee Jones), well known in New Orleans business circles as a wealthy benefactor and who had connections with Ferrie and thus Oswald. Garrison and his team have Shaw picked up for arrest despite their inquiries producing only denials.

 

"Oh, you are so naive"

 

One aspect of the film that is both a high achievement and problematic is the way that it mixes archive footage with deftly re-created new footage in such a way that it is nearly impossible to determine one from the other. Stone and his cinematographer, the wizardly Robert Richardson, mix and match formats, color and black-and-white, 35mm and 16mm, and all sorts of film stocks to create and re-create source footage and the results are nearly indistinguishable, especially the way they are cross-cut between each other. It lends the air of verisimilitude—and certainly adds a dynamic tension between the transitions—but one is never sure if one should believe what one is seeing. Is that press footage from the day of the shooting or is Stone just fabricating something he wants you to see?

It's troubling. There's a fine line between making it look right and obfuscation and given that film, by its very nature, is manipulative—even with documentaries—the level of distrust this attention to detail evokes is extremely high. What are we to believe? The answer is whatever the director wants you to believe. And given Richardson's deserving Oscar-winning work on this film to match the look, the grain and the confusion of archive footage, some of which might even be familiar, distinguishing the true from forgery is almost impossible. And audiences become susceptible.

One should always be aware that it's a fictional film of real-life events. And rather than speaking truth, it can only come up with conjecture.

 

"And the truth is on your side, bubba."

 

Stone makes his own case on what happened in a middle sequence where Garrison goes to Washington D.C. to meet an informant, a former military official who only identifies himself as "X" (Donald Sutherland, who's brilliant in a role of pure exposition). That Garrison would fly to D.C. to meet an anonymous source strains credulity (he surely must know his name before agreeing to meet, but then, the reality is Garrison never met this character, communicating with him in un-cinematic exchanges of letters).

It is 'X''s contention that Kennedy was making feasibility studies for withdrawing troops from Vietnam—"X" was doing the inquiries—and that this rattled the cages of the Pentagon and the CIA. "X" is unexpectedly assigned to...Antarctica...and only learns of the assassination the next day when he reads a New Zealand newspaper that has a full run-down on Oswald as the assassin when he hadn't even been charged yet. To "X" this smacks of "black ops" work (which he also used to do). Oh, and did I mention that "X" was also part of Kennedy's security detail? "X" seems to have got around.

Anyway, by the end of his exposition, "X" has a conspiracy that could involve the Pentagon, "the military-industrial complex", FBI, CIA, Cuban exiles, the Mafia, the Secret Service and Lyndon B. Johnson—he was in the fired-upon motorcade, after all—and all of them had grudges against Kennedy, but mostly, they didn't want to cease operations in Vietnam which was making a lot of people a lot of money. This is the same Vietnam War that Oliver Stone fought in from 1967 to 1968 with the 25th Infantry, which was a traumatic experience for him, and that he has made the subject of three of his films.

"X" refuses to come forward with this information and flat-out refuses to be a witness for Garrison's prosecution, but "X" tells him that his best chance is that he's the only guy conducting a trial involving the Kennedy assassination. "Your only chance," he says "is to come up with a case. Something. Anything. Make arrests. Stir the shit-storm. Hope to start a chain reaction of people coming forward. Then the government will crack." And, with those words of encouragement, he walks away, leaving Garrison hanging. Stone cuts to the Eternal Flame at Kennedy's grave. When Stone gets in trouble, he goes for sentimentality.

The film's last hour is that most deadly of momentum killers, a trial, with Exhibit A being a long speech by one character...in this case Garrison.* That speech wouldn't stand in a court of law and it isn't made clear if it's a closing argument (that barely mentions the defendant Clay Shaw) or a part of Garrison's evidentiary overview (it starts with objections from the defense and then they are never heard from again), but Stone is dramatically stretching truth...and credulity...to make his point. And it goes on forever, like the stultifying final speech in court in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. It's only Stone's direction, Richardson's chameleon cinematography and Joe Hutshing and Pietro Scalia's quick-silver editing that keeps it interesting as film. And almost impossible to make counter-arguments against the assertions, they come so fast and furiously.

Stone's film ends with "what's past is prologue." Okay, so let's look at the past. All previous American political assassinations, successful or otherwise, before and after Kennedy's own, have been due to "lone gun-men" (or women). The most suspicious shooting is that of Martin Luther King, Jr.  And most damning of all, recent events have seen Presidents and Vice-Presidents questioning or ignoring, even humiliating their own intelligence or military agencies...but manage to remain very much alive. Kennedy was less of a threat...he merely wanted to wind down a war...as has been done recently...and Stone would have you think he was killed for it.

Yet, History doesn't bear that out. In fact, though they may rebel (or at least write a book), they don't assassinate. "That dog don't hunt."

Remember, "what's past is prologue."

But, the film did have an impact. 99% of the documents that were sealed after the assassination have been brought to light, particularly to the issues raised in the movie (The President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992 was passed in 1992, the year after the movie's release). Although the stated goal of the act was to release all documents by October 2017, some still have not been released. Trump went back on a promise to release them pushing it back to when he was out of office, then Biden delayed them (COVID...for some reason) then released some in 2022 and 2023.** We're at 99% except for those that would cause "identifiable harm... to the military, defense, intelligence operations, law enforcement, or conduct of foreign relations... of such gravity that it outweighs the public interest in disclosure."

Same old excuse. "It'll keep us from doing our jobs" they say, even if those jobs have dramatically changed in 60 years. But, if JFK is worth anything, it is for its shaming of our government agencies' lack of transparency to commit them to act in that 1992 law. Six decades is two generations of secrets. Too many people and too many prominent people have expressed their doubts to not have as many answers as possible to wash away as many questions as possible.

Not that that will make a difference. We've reached the Age of Un-reason where nobody believes their own eyes anymore. If everything was released, unredacted and transparent, it is doubtful that the truth would be accepted...especially by those who make their livings as professional doubters and skeptics.

The true conspiracy has always been theirs. As in the mantra of All the President's Men, one merely has to "follow the money."

"It's up to you."

 

* The film is awash with cameo's and "guest-stars" in what Stone intended to be like the roster of The Longest Day, but it feels more like the many odd cameos in The Greatest Story Ever Told, that seem ill-though-out and are actually distracting and pull you right out of the movie. John Candy? 

** This is just part of Garrison's summation from the film:

The Warren Commission thought they had an open-and-shut case. Three bullets, one assassin. But two unpredictable things happened that day that made it virtually impossible. One, the eight-millimeter home movie taken by Abraham Zapruder while standing by the grassy knoll. Two, the third wounded man, James Tague, who was knicked by a fragment, standing near the triple underpass. The time frame, five point six seconds, determined by the Zapruder film, left no possibility of a fourth shot. So the shot or fragment that left a superficial wound on Tague's cheek had to come from the three shots fired from the sixth floor depository. That leaves just two bullets. And we know one of them was the fatal head shot that killed Kennedy. So now a single bullet remains. A single bullet now has to account for the remaining seven wounds in Kennedy and Connelly. But rather than admit to a conspiracy or investigate further, the Warren Commission chose to endorse the theory put forth by an ambitious junior counselor, Arlen Spector, one of the grossest lies ever forced on the American people. We've come to know it as the "Magic Bullet Theory." This single-bullet explanation is the foundation of the Warren Commission's claim of a lone assassin. Once you conclude the magic bullet could not create all seven of those wounds, you'd have to conclude that there was a fourth shot and a second rifle. And if there was a second rifleman, then by definition, there had to be a conspiracy.

*** Whether Trump will release any more documents in his next term one can only speculate. I don't believe a word the man says so even if he says he will, I'd be looking at updates on the website: https://www.archives.gov/research/jfk

The Good Shepherd (2006)

Written at the time of the film's release...

  The Good Shepherd (Robert DeNiro, 2006) Eric Roth's screenplay for The Good Shepherd seems to have gone through as many hands as states' secrets before actually being put before the cameras. A "personal" telling of the formation of the CIA, Francis Ford Coppola was the first director to have signed to it—then retained enough interest to keep an "executive producer" credit (although Wayne Wang, Philip Kaufman and John Frankenheimer—who interested his Ronin star, Robert De Niro in the project—were also briefly attached before De Niro, who was working on his own CIA project, took it over). Bless my tapped telephone line it has that same sort of "Godfather" family epic-feel to it, with just enough schmaltz and soap to keep it from getting too caught up in its overarching theme of constant paranoia. It also carries the similar pall of "the sins of the father" to it. You just know that the ambitions of the men in the movie will doom their families, if not themselves.

Edward Wilson (Matt Damon) is recruited out of college to join the Skull and Bones secret society, and with his first ratting out of a professor (Michael Gambon), his career as a spy takes the fast track. It's derailed slightly when a quickie with the Boss's precocious daughter (Angelina Jolie) results in pregnancy and a marriage of convenience. Then, when fencing with the Soviets keeps him overseas for years, his fair-weather family-life causes a Cold War on both sides of the Atlantic. 

Soon, Wilson learns, a little too late, that he should trust no one, as he plays against (and develops a mutual admiration with) his equal in the KGB. But its the same old story we've gotten used to in the spy genre. Everybody's a snake looking out for Number One, and trying to make "that Big Score," and yeah, okay, there's only a gray flanneled thread of difference between the spy network and Corporate America. 

Which brings us right back to "Godfather" country. CIA-Mafia-GM, there's no (*yawn*) difference. The only likable character in the entire film is director Robert DeNiro's turn as "Bill Sullivan"--a veiled version of Bill Donovan, but he's there for two quick dashes of cold-water perspective and is gone. Matt Damon seems not to age at all during the film, whereas Angelina Jolie does seem to gain twenty years. This film came out at the same time as The Good German, and I was hoping someone would combine them into "The Good German Shepherd". Well, I can dream...

It's interesting (well, to me, anyway) to wonder why Damon chose this part, seeing as how his "Bourne" films are merely the "fantasy" side of the "spy" franchise. If he thought that playing the "button-pusher," rather than the blunt instrument was an acting "stretch," he couldn't be more wrong.

The Irishman (I Heard You Paint Houses) (2019)

A Tragic Loyalty
or
Tales From the Last Man Standing ("It's What It Is...")

“Blind faith in your leaders, or in anything, will get you killed.”

Bruce Springsteen

“I don’t see them. I tried, you know? But that’s not cinema. Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well-made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.”

Martin Scorsese, Empire Magazine interview

Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola say (in their own ways) that Super-hero movies are not cinema and they are right to a certain extent, at least in how it creates a studio myopia on what gets made and what doesn't. Because unless the movie has people with emblems on their chest (and are seriously marketable as action figures), they're consigned to streaming services like Netflix, which, if you think about it, is one step up from premiering on the SYFY channel (which is one step up from direct-to-video..if such a thing still exists).

Nerd's eye opinion of Martin Scorsese.

We could go on about how tent-pole films dominate theater-schedules (when theaters have schedules again once we're past our pandemic focus) and even major film-makers are having trouble attracting studio interest, but that would just be kvetching ("All you kids get out of my theater!"). But, Scorsese did manage to get Netflix to buy into The Irishman, his long-in-the-works adaptation of Charles Brandt's book "I Heard You Paint Houses" when Robert De Niro first proposed it after its publication in 2004, and Scorsese's been working on it since 2007.

Better late than never. And without a Miramax (and Harvey Weinstein) breathing down his neck, one can see what a late-Scorsese film without studio badgering looks like. What we get is a 3 hour film told in nested-flashback of Sheeran's (one must say disputed) reminiscinces of his war experience, brief work as a trucker, and his being enfolded into the world of the Mafia and Teamsters politics as a hit-man and then as body-man for Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa (played by Al Pacino).

That "nested flashback" structure is interesting, as it's a bit more complex than, say, Once Upon a Time in America, where Sergio Leone has an elderly De Niro return to New York to investigate a past mystery, or Arthur Penn's Little Big Man where Dustin Hoffman's Jack Crabbe narrates his own fanciful take on History. Here, Sheeran resides in a nursing home and relates his history ("It's what is is..."), flashing back and forth between a fateful trip to the wedding of the daughter of lawyer Bill Bufalino (Ray Romano) in 1975, and the events that led up to that road trip.

It takes a bit of patience and a reliance on our memory of how people look—which is very risky as so much of that is dependent on CGI de-aging technology, particularly of De Niro, Pacino and Joe Pesci—who came out of retirement for this role (and who gives the best and most subtle performance of his career).*

That road-trip is given the most detail and the most dialing-down of information because of its implications in how it affects the rest of the world and in Sheeran's moral decline.

Sheeran briefly looks to us when backed into a corner on the road-trip ("It is what is is")

De Niro's Sheeran is a perpetual foot-soldier, following orders with the same mind-set instilled in him during WWII—you're given a job, you follow orders and you don't question them, but merely carry them out. Yes, he considers the consequences, but there is a moral disconnect of responsibility, whether in war-time, or in civilian duties, to the point where the escalating consequences only produce a larger amount of hesitation before accepting the job." "In for a penny, In for a pound." He carries out his role without a second thought, other than the means to the various ends. 

Sheeran understands his role. He also understands the consequences of not carrying it out, which is always done quickly, coldly and efficiently—the body disposed of (or not) and the weapons used, just one of a growing number tossed into the river. He understands the consequences very well; one of the neat touches that Scorsese tosses in, whenever a new character is introduced, is a short title identifying the person and the date and the means by which they died. You just met them and you already see their death sentence. The rule is: don't get attached. Relationships are short and fragile in that sphere of influence. 

And it is one of influence. The Irishman is one of Scorsese's quietest, more subdued pictures—there's not a lot of fancy camera moves, merely an angular movement done at a steady pace. And there are no acting fire-works...except from Pacino—who seems to have taken on the Pesci "wild card" role in this one—or some of the more volatile actors in the game. But, there is such—I hate to use the term "civility" among mobsters—but shrewd, measured calmness, that when someone does get volatile—or a little out of whack—they're going to get "whacked." It may just be a matter of time.

The Irishman is so measured that you take note of the silences and there are many, especially on the part of De Niro's Sheeran, as he digests what is expected of him, sometimes that takes a little understanding and realization. These aren't mobsters, who come right out and Cagney-like, say "I'm gonna kill ya"—that would be too obvious, especially in a world of wire-tape and undercover cops, and especially as so many are done is social gatherings. The words, when they come, are calm and proceeded by justification, an understanding and presentation of larger issues, arguments that make it difficult to say "no" (except by personal choice and then it's "on you") and that just seems impossible in Sheeran's case.

The final fate of Jimmy Hoffa

Nobody comes out and talks murder or assassination—too obvious and too traceable. The title of Brandt's book, based on Sheeran, "I Heard You Paint Houses"—which is also revealed by a separate title card as a continuation of the title of the film—refers to one's reputation as a killer or hit-man, as "painting houses" refers to blood spray-patterns. That abstract circumlocution is the manner in which things are conveyed—words best left unsaid, but woe if they are not done.

It's all done, so that there is no price to pay. But, there is. Being a Scorsese film, The Irishman does have a conscience, a cost, and for Sheeran, it is placed in his daughter Peggy (played first by Lucy Gallina as a child, and then by Anna Paquin), who early on, when she is pushed by a grocer, Dad goes over and throws the guy through his own glass door. When, Ed becomes involved with Russell Bufalino (Pesci), the older man tries to ingratiate himself—constantly—with the little girl, but she almost has an aversion to him, reverting to a stony silence at the presentation of a present. She does, however, appreciate Hoffa for his efforts to help "the common guy" in his Union, and when Hoffa disappears without a trace, she gets only evasions from her Teamster-father, which estrange him from her forever.

Scorsese has a daughter—she's the one who challenged her Dad to "make a movie people like" (which resulted in Hugo, which set no box office records, but it's certainly likable)—so, it's no surprise that she would be the cost for his lack of character, for his survival in a world of ultimate costs and truncated lives. It's ironic—what would a Scorsese film be without irony?—that his survival to old-age in a world of short-life expectancy should be lived along and apart and shuttered away from his family. That's the cost for long-life.

The Irishman is getting the best reviews of Scorsese's considerable career, and one can guess why: access. On wide-release, you get one or two chances to see and then the judgment gavel comes down. But Scorsese is subtle, even in excess. And having The Irishman immediately available for repeated consumption, one can see the touches, the intricacies in this, one of his most subtle films.

* An aside on this de-aging thing, especially in regarding The Irishman. Sure, you can erase wrinkles from a man's face, sharpen his nose, shave the jowls, and the loose skin. But you can not put bounce in a step, spryness in a gait, or unhunch the shoulders and the careful, gingerly pace of a 76 year old actor. That's the big betrayal of time. The only way you could conquer that is to replace the actor with a younger man...in which case, you wouldn't have De Niro. The made the best choice by compromising with time...as we all do.