Eye opener for those who think America means 'Peace'

Rating: 8/10 (25 August 2006)

On October 13th 1962 Americans found that Cuba has acquired nuclear missiles from USSR and they will be operational in a few days. It was basically a problem USA created by deploying missiles in UK, Italy and Turkey and brought the whole world again at the brink of nuclear war. 'Thirteen days' is the story of Pentagon and White house during one ofthe biggest crisis of 'cold war'. The story has three protagonists who in the history have gone down as 'Irish Mafia'. Movie is pretty accurate as far as incidents and people are concerned. Movie depicts how war-loving American administration is.
JFK is a complex man to deal with in a film. Although people say that Bay of Pigs was planned before he came into power he took full responsibility of its failure. He sent 18,000 soldiers to support south Vietnamese government, formed Allaince of Progress to aid south American countries which of course meant to bring south American countries under American imperialism and designed a similar program called 'Peace Corps'. Its difficult to find out what's good or bad in these plans as America is a country whose base is propaganda. They drop a nuclear bomb and say it was for the best of human race and drop bombs in the name of 'liberation'. Still JFK was a man with a thinking brain. He called King's wife in 1960 when King was in jail. I'm bound to think that intentions of JFK were not as imperialist as rest of the nation's. The other important characters are Robert Kennedy and his college friend Kenny O' Donnel who is adviser to the President. Robert Kennedy is known for criticizing Johnson's government for Vietnam and supporting civil rights movement and Kenny is one of the earliest Vietnam Critic. This film is basically showing these three thinking men in the middle of war mongers. I think it was a difficult job but Roger Donaldson did a good job. Of course Americans call JFK 'weak' because he didn't rage a war on Cuba. Too bad he did not kill innocent people!! That's not patriotism in their eyes.
I think its a good script and OK acting. Bruce Greenwood as JFK was very good. He kept playing around with his coat button like JFK. Steven Culp as RFK was very good too. Thank god there wasn't any attention payed to Jaquelin Kennedy. Actor or original can't stand any of hers. Kevin Costner was just OK. I think he didn't realize that he is not doing a regular Hollywood macho-man stuff. Its a good history lesson for American people who think that America is all about peace and liberation. Movie clearly shows that the only reason JFK didn't strike was that he was not sure if he can stop Cubans using nuclear missiles. I think although Cold war was a farce a weak country like USSR held USA for 40-44 years while other countries stood up on its feet. If there was no USSR USA would have literally killed the whole world in the name of liberation. I think cold war was a blessing in disguise. We must thank Gorbachev for disclosing his cards at the right time. Its funny when you see a dwarf like Ronald Regan talking with a visionary like Gorbachev and saying "we have created history". History will tell who created history and who accidentally became a part of it. At any rate its a film to watch if you are a history freak rest is Hollywood Jazz. 8 on 10.