‘Parkland’s’ point of view

Movie critic Mick LaSalle of SF Gate says “Parkland” is not completely convincing.

Director Peter Landesman, LaSalle writes:

“never shows the Zapruder film but chooses, instead, the more emotionally effective strategy of showing various characters seeing the film and reacting with horror. Thus, something familiar regains its power to disturb us. Yet curiously none of the characters – including the Secret Service chief played by Billy Bob Thornton – ever expresses surprise at seeing the president apparently getting shot from the front right, when he was supposedly shot from the back right.”

“This is where Landesman hits some difficulty he can gloss over but never quite overcome. The goal may be to present the facts, but some facts are in dispute. Landesman, who based the film on a book by Vincent Bugliosi, believes in the Warren Report, but he knows that if he goes too far in that direction he will alienate half his audience. But he slants some things. For example, the coroner who insisted that Kennedy’s body stay in Dallas for an autopsy is presented as an officious jerk, while the Secret Service agents who rushed the body back to Washington are portrayed as loyal, sensitive souls. Someone else might have written that scene in another way.”

Good point. It was violation of Texas law to remove the president’s body from the state. Standing up for the law wasn’t officious jerkdom.

Watch the trailer:

 

2 thoughts on “‘Parkland’s’ point of view”

  1. richard bittner

    Mr. Bugliosi relies on the ” magic bullet ” theory that has been throughly discredited to the point of ridicule. For those unfamiliar,checkout the Seinfeld episode refering to the magic loogie(sp?)
    .

  2. Re:”Movie critic Mick LaSalle of SF Gate says “Parkland” is not completely convincing.”

    It does not need to be,as it is a film,not a documentary : as I’ve pointed out before,only the gullible confuse entertainment with history. It is futile to attempt to point out this stuff for their benefit,because the gullible will never learn how to think critically,or be inspired to read dry tomes of evidence or history.

    Does anybody “learn” the history of the Apache or Sioux by watching a John Wayne movie?
    If pliant movie-goers want to get their JFK history whilst munching popcorn and guzzling a Coke,let them do so.
    The more thoughtful of us – be we CT or LN – do not need the “support” of their opinions , formed in the confines of their limited intellect

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