JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass

Thirty years on, Oliver Stone returns to a subject that obsesses him.

In September 1964, the report of the Warren Commission was published and it was doubtless hoped that its conclusions regarding the assassination of President Kennedy the year before would put an end to speculations on the matter. Far from it. During 1966 Mark Lane’s book Rush to Judgment criticising their findings was published and it became a best seller. Emile de Antonio’s documentary of the same title, again involving Mark Lane, appeared in 1967. But for the most notable film on the subject one had to wait until 1991 when Oliver Stone gave us JFK made with a starry cast of actors. It too challenged the viewpoint adopted in the Warren Report and, while some of the alternative ideas put forward by Stone were themselves considered questionable, his movie, admirably made, was hailed as a work that provided great drama.

Over the years Stone has maintained an obsessive interest in the subject and now taking advantage of documents declassified by the Assassination Records Review Board, not least those made available in 2017, he returns to the subject in JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass. This time around he offers us a documentary work, but the impact is hardly less dramatic than that of JFK itself. Whether viewers come to it familiar with the killing of Kennedy or approach this new film to learn up on it, they will find that this piece has compelling power and it has been assembled in a way that shows Stone’s sense of cinema at its best. The editing and general presentation of the material have such force that one doesn’t even question whether or not Jeff Beal’s dramatic music score gilds the lily. In contrast, Whoopi Goldberg and Donald Sutherland adopt a quieter tone as they deliver the narration in a manner that is appropriately self-effacing.

Although I understand that the two hours or so of this film are only part of what was shot so that a much longer version could yet appear, it seems an apt length as it stands. In effect this is a film in two parts of which the first is the more potent even though both combine new interview footage with archive material and readily hold the interest. The focus in the first half is on the details of the killing and on the extent to which so many facts make one question the official version, especially the view that it was a one-man operation and that Lee Harvey Oswald was the killer. The extra information now available makes it even more certain that Kennedy’s death was brought about through a conspiracy and in the second half of this film Stone elaborates further the theory that he postulated in JFK, namely that the CIA and the FBI were behind it. Enough has emerged since that could be felt to support this supposition, but while it is intriguing it is hardly conclusive. For that reason, the first part of the film confirming beyond question that there is so much that has never been answered satisfactorily is the more effective. Nevertheless, even though JFK Revisited fails to be the final word on the subject, it usefully keeps the issues alive while also reminding us of Oliver Stone’s strengths as a filmmaker.

MANSEL STIMPSON

Featuring  Gary Aguilar, Cyril H. Wecht, Robert F. Kennedy Jr, Jefferson Morley, Michael Chesser, James Gochenaur, Douglas Horne, David Mantik, John M. Newman, Lisa Pease, Donald Miller, Paul Bleau, Oliver Stone and the voices of Whoopi Goldberg and Donald Sutherland. 

Dir Oliver Stone, Pro Rob Wilson, Screenplay James Di Eugenio, based on his book, Ph Robert Richardson, Ed Kurt Mattila, Music Jeff Beal. 

IXTLAN Productions/Ingenious Media/Pantagruel Productions-Altitude Film Entertainment.
118 mins. USA. 2021. Rel: 28 November 2021. Cert. 15.