A cinematic masterpiece - based on bogus history

Rating: 8/10 (30 December 2007)

Even after more than 15 years, Oliver Stone's "JFK" remains a stunning masterpiece of storytelling. Mixing reality and fiction, color and black & white snippets beyond the point of information overload, it's the precursor of ultra-rapid cut political thrillers like the "Bourne Identity". It is also a statement on the power of movies. Largely modeled after the book "On the Trail of the Assassins" by Jim Garrison, the New Orleans prosecutor who provides the heroic figure for "JFK" and has become famous as the only one who ever brought the Kennedy assassination to trial, it promotes the idea that the JFK case - maybe along with the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and even Martin Luther King - is really solved, if you watch/read the two in sequence. The book got a major interest boost from the film.
According to various evaluations I found on the net, a majority of Americans actually take most of "JFK's" assertions as facts, while of course expecting small artistic liberties. I did so myself, having read Garrison's book. One cannot help but wonder, if these "facts" are true, why are they not investigated? There are entire websites devoted to "debunking" conspiracy "myths", but their common mistake is usually to make the reader angry or flatly refuse to acknowledge the validity of questions. On the other hand, would the alleged dark government forces really use such a bunch of losers for the hit of the century? Since Jim Garrison's book is the source of most of "JFK's" claims, its credibility rests on Garrison's shoulders. The movie's hero is accused of pressurizing and even drugging witnesses, persecuting people for their homosexuality, wasting taxpayer's money etc. All of these claims seem ridiculous and are either attributed to a hostile press, a tired wife, a public won over by the Warren Report or government pressure... Garrison really had to fight all the demons of hell at once to get the truth out! Except that it wasn't really that way. Google up "The Assassination Goes Hollywood!" for a step-by-step debunking of "JFK" that doesn't make you mad at first glance. Delve deeper and the picture of Jim Garrison - and his times - changes entirely.
One of the movie's most subtle, but most basic distortions is the claim that everybody believed in the Oswald "myth" from the start, at the latest after the Warren Report. In reality, conspiracy "myths" sprang to life almost instantly, and a large majority of the public was not satisfied with the official explanations, just like today. Garrison wasn't the only one "investigating" and speculating, not even the most vocal. Public pressure eventually forced a commission to re-investigate the facts.
Numerous books have been written on the Garrison trial: "False Witness" by Patricia Lambert and "American Grotesque" by James Kirkwood, among others. "Garrison has made a comeback that would have made Richard Nixon proud", writes a commentator. They all conclude that Garrison whitewashed his investigation and misrepresented important details of the trial (errors that were faithfully repeated - and artfully inflated - by Oliver Stone). Garrison tried for years and failed, not because of a small missing piece of evidence for a "guilty" verdict, but because in reality, the jurors thought he had no case - absolutely nothing to credibly back up even the smallest of his claims, which had grown ever more sensational over time. The press, who would have loved anything spectacular, had abandoned him before the trial was over. Serious reporters and conspiracy buffs alike didn't take him seriously anymore. It took "JFK" to resurrect him.
There remains the issue of - the real - Clay Shaw, who looks guilty as hell on screen. The movie states before the end credits roll that CIA director Richard Helms later admitted that Shaw had worked for the CIA. That's not true. All Shaw was ever "convicted" of was being homosexual, which was confirmed by some of his acquaintances, and that he owned some sadomasochistic equipment. Count the number of homosexual suspects in the movie, and the claim that Garrison believed in a "gay plot" looks less incredible. Whatever Garrison may have thought, Shaw's forced "coming out" cost him dearly in social status. Shaw (and Ferry) are dead now. Is it true that in the United States, the laws of defamation apply only to the living?
Memory is fleeting, film is forever.
On the whole, all of "JFK's" central claims turn out to be pure myths, yet there is hope that some day one version of what really took place will be generally accepted, and it will be the right one. The merit of any controversial film is that it encourages discussion - and maybe research on the part of the viewer. There is nothing wrong with purely enjoying a good movie, as long as it's taken with a grain of salt.