Review of Parkland (2013) by Dillinger P — 22 Dec 2014

By now, everyone and their mother knows at least one version of events, on one of Americas darkest hours, the Assassination of JFK. This is also not the first time a film has been made about the incident, so in 2013 what does it have to offer us? Well apart from some mesmerising acting, tense dramatic scenes and frenetic editing work, not a whole lot new.

Parkland follows the 3 to 4 days after the assassination, following everyone from Zapruda to the Oswald family, its a stonking cast as well, with plenty of talent in the mix. Everything we bare witness to here is brilliantly done and mixing real footage with the film has some strengths.

However the film feels like just another addition to the JFK saga, it borders over conspiracy from time to time but doesnt have the heart to go there. It's like a professional documentarian trying to sit as much on the fence as possible.

This would be good if it were about a new subject, considering that the events of that day are now so wildly talked about and theorized over, its hard to not picture its inclusion in here. The film also feels a bit flattened after its half way point, it just runs out of juice and goes through the motions for the 3rd act, which is hard to critic too harshly as the same could be said about the mourning of any human being.

Still the source material shines through, the actors do a great job and the camera work and editing all hold everything together as we are thrown around like the key players that day. It's just that by the end you cant help but feel, what was the point?