Chuckles Film Reviews

This will be, I hope, a recurring feature that will be on the blog each time I watch a film. I used to love films so much and could watch a pile of them in my spare time. However with my focus on reading, I find little time to enjoy films that are new to me but now I need to start clearing the unwatched pile and get some space back! Here are the latest films I watched.

American politics have always interested me and I've always been fascinated by the Kennedy assassination. I've lost count of how many books I read on the subject along with the films and documentaries. I decided to watch two featuring the aftermath of the assassination. 

1) Jackie
Starring Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, Greta Gerwig, Billy Crudup, John Hurt, Richard E Grant and John Carroll Lynch.

In the days after the assassination, Jackie speaks to a carefully chosen journalist to try to set up her husband's legacy. 

I like Natalie Portman as an actress and she takes the part of Jackie really well, paying attentions to that girlish whisper of a voice, the accent, the awkward mannerisms and the stiff way she conducted herself. She was particularly good in the scenes surrounding the events on the day, especially just after arriving from the hospital with Jack's body and trying to clean herself up for the swearing in of Lyndon Johnson on the aircraft. I also liked the portrayed relationship with her right hand woman Nancy and the somewhat strained relationship with Bobby Kennedy. I thought her acting was excellent and the problems with the film were not related to her as she did her best with the material provided.

The plot choices for the basis of the film were not greatly interesting. Despite the best efforts of the actors involved, I did not find the verbal sparring of Jackie and the journalist interesting in any way. In fact I found it tedious and dull, and found myself thinking that Jackie was a rude. controlling, self obsessed woman who set out to make the interview impossible for him. She does not comes across as a particularly nice woman in these scenes, with her obsession over how she wants the world to remember her husband and verbal put downs. Her scenes with Bobby Kennedy are similar and Peter Sarsgaard perfectly shows how he was trying to deal with his brother's death and Jackie's moods which must have been a real challenge. 

I also found it strange that so much of the film was set around that film that Jackie did showing everyone around the White House after her restoration. I found that pretty dull and I'd much rather have focused on the assassination than her talking about fabrics and furniture all the time, and strolling around her home to show it off. Most of the rest is set around the ever changing funeral arrangements which I found as frustrating as Bobby and Lyndon Johnson's staff did. The best bits were the actual flashbacks to the assassination and the hospital but there wasn't enough of that for me. I also found it strange that there was so little screen time for Jack Kennedy, who we only glimpse a couple of times. Yes I get that the film is about Jackie but we see nothing of their relationship, just a brief comment on his philandering. It seems to be more about Jackie obsessing over everything she wants done and riding roughshod over the feelings of everyone else. Finally, why go into such detail on the funeral and NOT have John saluting his father's coffin? It was more iconic than Jackie walking through endless streets or across muddy fields at Arlington.

The directing was just horrible. The timeline jumped around so much that it all became quite confusing as to when Jackie was talking to Nancy-before, during or after the assassination or before, during or after the funeral and reburial. Her chats to the priest were not exciting, despite the fine performance of John Hurt, as again it was jumping around all over the place. I hated the lack of cohesion in the plot, which would have been so much better if it just followed the actual timeline. It would have brought the good acting out and given more impact and emotion to a very wooden script. The constant jumping between the journalist, Bobby, the priest, the government with Jackie was somewhat frustrating. The music choice was weird too. It is hard to describe but it gave the film a really strange sound to it too. And I swear if I have to hear that bloody Camelot song once more, I'm going to hurt someone. It ground on my last remaining nerve!

Had they done the straight story following the events of the assassination and funeral, the actors could have delivered on something much better than what actually appeared on screen. They did their best but the mixture of strange directing, poor plot choices, woeful script and dialogue and incoherant timeline meant that the film overall was pretty poor.

2) Parkland
Starring Billy Bob Thornton, Zac Efron, Paul Giamatti, Ron Livingston, James Badge Dale, Marcia Gay Harden, Jacki Weaver and David Harbour.

This film looks at the days surrounding the assassination from JFK's arrival at Love Field until the burial of Lee Harvey Oswald, through the eyes of hospital staff, the Secret Service, FBI, witnesses and the Oswald family.

This was my second JFK related film of the night and I'm pleased to say that I loved it. We start by seeing what everyone was doing on the day that the President was arriving in Dallas. The local FBI were in their offices looking out for any threats and joking about the wanted posters out for Kennedy, the local Secret Service were at Love Field as the Kennedy's arrive with their own protection, the staff at the hospital were starting another day of work and seeing patients and the excited people in the city were headed out to find the perfect spot to welcome the President, including the man who filmed the assassination Abraham Zapruder. Seeing the excitement and energy of everyone, especially Zapruder just makes you even sadder about what is to come next.

The assassination is tense and shocking, and we see that from Zapruder's perspective, played brilliantly and with such emotion by Paul Giamatti. His cheerful schoolboy excitement turns to shock and horror in seconds as he realises what has happened. His stunned cries then rapidly turn to the crippling realisation that he has filmed the murder of the President, and his life will forever change. Watching him struggle with that is very moving. He is then approached by Forrest Sorrels, played by the excellent Billy Bob Thornton, who puts a detail of men around Zapruder to protect him and his precious film from everyone who suddenly wants a piece of him. We are right with the Secret Service as they rush the President to the hospital and follow them right through Kennedy's death and trying to get his body to the plane and back to Washington. 

The aftermath of the horror comes watching the hospital staff try everything to save Kennedy's life and how their efforts are in vain. We see the people closest to him begin to grieve-Jackie, his agents, his personal doctor. We witness the fight to get the body released and the struggles to get the coffin onto the aircraft. We follow the start of the FBI investigation and the blame game, the arrest of Oswald and what is does to his family, then the shooting that leads the staff at the hospital to this time try to save Oswald's life, again in vain. 

This was such a human story, looking at ordinary people swept up in a tragedy, local law enforcement trying to investigate in the middle of a disaster and the people close to Kennedy grieving because they cannot save him. It was so raw and emotional, and the acting was superb. Everything from the mentally shattered Zapruder, to the exhausted hospital staff, the FBI agent blamed for not arresting Oswald sooner, to the bitch from hell that was Oswald's mother, revelling in her fame and trying to get financial gain from the whole mess. She was so horrible that I wanted to punch her, beautifully played by Jacki Weaver. I thought the whole cast did a great job. The script was excellent, the events cohesive and nerve jangling, the assassination brutal and shocking and the immediate aftermath fascinating. The film also avoids going into any conspiracy theory, just showing how things unfolded on those days based on evidence available.

I just loved this film and will watch it many times.