Ironic Masterpiece that exposes Conspiracy Theory

Rating: Null/10 (2 February 2003)

While I doubt it was Stone's intention, his "JFK" does more to damage the credibility of the conspiracy theorists than any other work besides Posner's "Case Closed." In telling the story of Jim Garrison, the man who never met a theory he didn't believe, Stone convincingly tells the story of almost 30 years of wacky "theories"--none of which have stood up to even the most cursory scrutiny. He, does, however, leave out one very important group of characters, namely, the small army of conspiracy nuts who attached themselves to Garrison's "investigation" with all the tenacity of a bunch of leeches going after a warm body.
The great irony is that Stone himself genuinely seemed to believe in a conspiracy and set out to create a counter-myth to stand against the much-maligned but never seriously refuted conclusions of the Warren Commission. And given that Stone is an incredibly gifted film-maker (or was anyway), his version is quite a bit more entertaining than that dry 26 vol. report. But, as the movie progresses, the counter-myth becomes ever more maniacal--it was the homosexual underworld, no, wait, the Cuban exiles, no, it was the Mob, no, it was the Mob and the CIA, no wait, it was the CIA and Lyndon Johnson, no, it was the entire structure of government and industry working with all the above!
There's no great mystery, really. The evidence (the real concrete evidence, not all the alleged forgeries and coverups and faked autopsies) has, and always did point at one person and one person only: Lee Harvey Oswald. And Stone, to his credit, gives time to this; and Gary Oldman, to his huge credit, creates a very convincing LHO. It's not too much of a stretch to imagine his character killing JFK. The creepy underworld of the conspiracy theorists is well depicted: the depraved homosexuals, the sinister "black ops" people, the lunatic fringe that Garrison dredged to produce his "case" against Shaw. Everyone and everything is over the top, as it should be.

The JFK Assassination has always been about sensationalism and hysteria and Stone captures this world perfectly. He also does an incredible job of re-creating the swirling sense of paranoia of the early 60s and the aura of government betrayal at a time when the Kennedys were assassinated (and MLK), the CIA seemed to be running amok, and the Vietnam War spinning out of control. The movie is an artistic triumph. It's also a fast primer into the world of conspiracy theory where every piece of evidence against Oswald is "fabricated" and every conjecture about a conspiracy the "truth." Garrison the lonely crusader for truth is accurately (and ironically) depicted as a guy who got caught up in the JFK obsession to the point where he believed anything and everything anybody told him. If Stone had any sense of irony of his own, he would have showed us how Garrison's massive ego and vendetta against Clay Shaw made him the perfect tool for conspiracy buffs who desperately needed an elected official (another irony) to demonstrate that other elected officials orchestrated the murder of JFK.
JFK: the Movie does more to make JFK: the Conspiracy look laughable than all of the conspiracy literature put together. It's an incredible movie about how a search for the truth becomes more twisted and bizarre than the "truth" it's supposedly pursuing. A great movie, if not for quite the same reasons as many posters here would have you believe.