I'm deeply sorry I had to betray my prejudices in my summary. I loved this movie, both because it helped me understand 20th century American History better, but also because it is the video memoir of one of the men who best characterized American military thinking at mid century. I summarize the movie this way because it should leave you with many questions.
We were all very excited about John F. Kennedy back when the Vietnam war was still only a civil war, and not yet a war of America against the communist bloc. JFK was widely respected, both for the agility of his mind, and his ability to take advice from others, even those he was confronting as enemies. Unfortunately, as we all know, the JFK presidency ended suddenly and prematurely, and the Vietnam War was escalated by a very different type of man, Lyndon Baines Johnson. This is the story about the man who ran the war for him. It is not a story about the war, it is a story about the man, and because the man is a philosopher, in a way it is a story about all men. McNamara makes it very clear that he is not an elitist. The film depicts him as a person trying to do his job as he saw it, as efficiently and carefully as he could, and like many of us, a person who was sometimes afraid to admit mistakes.
I hope you enjoy this film as much as I did.
We were all very excited about John F. Kennedy back when the Vietnam war was still only a civil war, and not yet a war of America against the communist bloc. JFK was widely respected, both for the agility of his mind, and his ability to take advice from others, even those he was confronting as enemies. Unfortunately, as we all know, the JFK presidency ended suddenly and prematurely, and the Vietnam War was escalated by a very different type of man, Lyndon Baines Johnson. This is the story about the man who ran the war for him. It is not a story about the war, it is a story about the man, and because the man is a philosopher, in a way it is a story about all men. McNamara makes it very clear that he is not an elitist. The film depicts him as a person trying to do his job as he saw it, as efficiently and carefully as he could, and like many of us, a person who was sometimes afraid to admit mistakes.
I hope you enjoy this film as much as I did.