John F. Kennedy: Years of Lightning, Day of Drums (1966)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

Bruce Herschensohn

Writer:

Bruce Herschensohn (writer)

Release Date:

July 1966 (UK)

Genre:

Documentary

Tagline:

A Special Act of Congress Makes It Possible For You to See This Special Motion Picture!

Plot Keywords:

Independent Film

Cast

Gregory Peck	...	Offscreen Narrator (voice)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Caroline Kennedy	...	Herself (archive footage)
Jacqueline Kennedy	...	Herself (archive footage)
John F. Kennedy	...	Himself (archive footage)
John Kennedy Jr.	...	Himself (archive footage)
Earl Warren	...	Himself (archive footage)

Runtime:

85 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Pathécolor) | Black and White

Sound Mix:

Mono

Company:

U.S. Information Agency

Trivia:

The film, produced by the United States Information Agency, was not intended for general public viewing. But it received such good advance notices that the Agency eventually let Embassy Pictures release the film to theatres so that the general public could see it, and a soundtrack album, featuring both music and narration, was even made in both mono and stereo by Capitol Records.

Quotes:

Offscreen Narrator: But the word that very few spoke, and the word with perhaps the greatest truth, was the word "prejudice". And most of the United States knew there was prejudice and wanted it to end. But even as the signs came down, the prejudice did not end.

1,000 days of the JFK Administration and one day of his burial

Bruce Herschensohn's documentary covers the remarkable 1,000 days of the JFK Administration and the day of the young president's burial. Along with domestic highlights such as Kennedy's White House speech to the first Peace Corps volunteers, the Civil Rights crisis and the space race, there are the dramatic international moments: the Cuban crisis, Berlin crisis — "if war begins, it begins in Moscow, not Berlin" — his journey to Costa Rica, his speech at the Berlin Wall and his visit to the Kennedy ancestral home in Ireland. Interspersed between these segments are poignant scenes from the 1963 funeral. The sense of grief and hope lost is palpable.

Gregory Peck's narration is at times stern, at times wistful: "History will pick up its cold pen and book, and write in chronological order the events of the day with the date and time and the city. But history will be wrong, for there wasn't one date, or time, or city." Produced by the United States Information Agency, Herschensohn's film is historically important as one can witness the process by which JFK the man becomes JFK the myth.