AT THE CHAZEN: CINEMA IN THE SHADOW OF THE JFK ASSASSINATION
WINTER KILLS
In recognition of the 60th anniversary of the assassination of President Kennedy, our series at the Chazen Museum of Art in October and November includes four movies that reflect audiences’ fascination with the murder, its effect on American society and culture, and the many conspiracy theories that emerged in the aftermath of November 22, 1963. From the 1970s, Alan Pakula’s The Parallax View and William Richert’s Winter Kills, showing in a new 35mm print, both create thinly veiled fictional spins on the assassination. From the early 1990s, Clint Eastwood stars as a Secret Service agent traumatized by his failure to protect Kennedy in In the Line of Fire; and Oliver Stone’s controversial JFK is an utterly compelling file-cabinet of a movie as it lays out its own, complicated conspiracy theories. These programs are also presented in conjunction with a new restoration of Emile De Antonio’s Rush to Judgment screening at our regular venue, 4070 Vilas Hall, on November 17.
- Sun., Oct. 22 | 2:00 PMChazen
Beatty stars as Joe Frady, a journalist obsessed with the assassination of a Kennedy-esque candidate. His investigation leads him to the mysterious Parallax Corporation, which just might be a recruiting organization for assassins. Along with director Pakula’s All the President’s Men, this is a bonafide Hollywood classic of political paranoia. 35mm print courtesy Wisconsin Center for Film & Theater Research.
- Sun., Oct. 29 | 2:00 PMChazen
This thinly veiled and hyper-paranoiac take on the JFK assassination stars Bridges as Nick Kegan, the scion of a fabulously wealthy and powerful family headed by patriarch Huston (“the real delight of the film” — Vincent Canby, The New York Times). Nick soon finds himself going down multiple rabbit holes while trying to unravel the conspiracy behind the murder of a U.S. president, his older brother. Based on a novel by Richard Condon (The Manchurian Candidate), Winter Kills’s supporting cast includes Toshiro Mifune, Anthony Perkins, Eli Wallach, Tomas Milian, Ralph Meeker, Richard Boone, and Elizabeth Taylor. A newly struck 35mm print, courtesy of Rialto Pictures, will be screened.
- Sun., Nov. 12 | 2:00 PMChazen
Eastwood is a veteran secret service agent, haunted by his inability to protect JFK in 1963 and now on the hunt for Malkovich, a chameleonic would-be presidential assassin. Both are in top form in Petersen’s sharply scripted thriller. A sterling supporting cast, several shocking twists, and a bevy of supremely suspenseful set-pieces all conspire to make this sleek cinematic rollercoaster one of the best of the 90s. (BR)
- Sun., Nov. 19 | 2:00 PMChazen
New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison (Costner), troubled by several local connections to the November, 1963 death of President Kennedy, launches his own investigation to determine who was involved with the assassination. In the several years that follow, Garrison uncovers a vast network of potential plotters and subversives, convincing him that Lee Harvey Oswald (Oldman) did not act alone. Controversial upon its original release, Stone’s fascinating, epic-length conspiracy theory (or theories) is brilliantly conveyed through groundbreaking editing by Joe Hutshing and Pietro Scalia, who, along with cinematographer Robert Richardson, won Oscars for their work. In addition to Oldman and the Oscar-nominated Jones, the jaw-dropping supporting cast includes Sissy Spacek, Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, John Candy, Kevin Bacon, Donald Sutherland, Edward Asner, and an unforgettable Joe Pesci as David Ferrie.