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National Geographic: Killing Kennedy (Sun. Nov. 10)

gregg75

gregg75

Info from TV Guide.
Yes this is based on Bill O'Reilly's book. Rob Lowe plays Kennedy. The show gives the "history" of both Kennedy and Oswald and lasts two hours (so the "shots" are probably near the end).

NGC has another new Kennedy show "JFK: The Final Hours" on Friday Nov. 8. Two hours also......"the final hours plus firsthand accounts of people who were with him" TV Guide has listed. Bill Paxton is the narrater. Bill saw Kennedy on that day as an 8-year-old in Ft. Worth where Kennedy gave a speech earlier (TV Guide sidebar). Bill's impression of Kennedy was that he was seeing a movie star.
 
^Why did you refer to each person mentioned in your message differently from each other? If I were typing a message like yours, I would have referred to each person in the message by both his or her first name and family name (or last name).
 
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gregg75 said:
Info from TV Guide.
NGC has another new Kennedy show "JFK: The Final Hours" on Friday Nov. 8. Two hours also......"the final hours plus firsthand accounts of people who were with him" TV Guide has listed. Bill Paxton is the narrater. Bill saw Kennedy on that day as an 8-year-old in Ft. Worth where Kennedy gave a speech earlier (TV Guide sidebar). Bill's impression of Kennedy was that he was seeing a movie star.
Click to expand...

WOW! This was a very good program. Lots of rarely if ever seen filmed footage and from a different perspective than most other Kennedy assination shows. They will probably show it over and over this month, well worth the view.

It will be hard for Killing Kennedy to top it!
 
A new drama may or may not be good. I hope for the best, but Rob Lowe as JFK? Kinda of a stretch, but I will reserve judgement till I see it.

In the meantime, National Geographic channel has been offering some solid programming on the 50th anniversary. The shows that have been airing tonight (Fri 11/8) have been good, especially the first block that offered footage that has rarely been seen, the 24 hours before the assasination. The 2nd block is more a retrospective of local anchors describing the situation. I thought this would be more compelling, but it really is kind of mundane, IMO. Perhaps this is because in '63 Dallas was not the major market that it is today. That being said, the reporting was good.

The most interesting part of the 50th programming is that this may be the last important anniversary of the assasination. Let's face it, most who were alive during this event are now approaching their 60's, or in their 70's and 80's. Like most media, the 60+ audience doesn't really matter anymore. The 75th anniversary will be even less interesting, and 100 years will make it Lincoln-esqe. These events have a way of dying out, in more ways than one.

The average 25-49 viewer has no recollection of this event. They may have some interest, but unless they lived through it they will consider it "history" that doesn't really reflect any hard interest.
 
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searadiofreak said:
The most interesting part of the 50th programming is that this may be the last important anniversary of the assasination. Let's face it, most who were alive during this event are now approaching their 60's, or in their 70's and 80's. Like most media, the 60+ audience doesn't really matter anymore. The 75th anniversary will be even less interesting, and 100 years will make it Lincoln-esqe. These events have a way of dying out, in more ways than one.

The average 25-49 viewer has no recollection of this event. They may have some interest, but unless they lived through it they will consider it "history" that doesn't really reflect any hard interest.
Click to expand...

You have hit the nail here. For my generation (this happened the day after my 13th birthday) the question is "Where were you when you heard etc?", as for my parents it was "Where were you when you heard about Pearl Harbor?"

I remember the 50th anniversary of Pearl Harbor. 22 years later, it seems to rate only a passing mention in the media.

My prediction: by the 75th (or even 100th) anniversary of JFK's assassination, we *still* won't know the true story.
 
I've seen a lot of the footage of the Dallas stations' coverage of the JFK assassination
on past History Channel specials, but, IIRC, a lot of ABC's coverage from Dallas came
from WFAA; I wasn't aware that ABC did have a correspondent there, Bill Lord, or that
Ted Koppel (then new to the network) described Kennedy's funeral procession (or at least
the transfer of the body from the White House to the Capitol Rotunda). And why didn't
somebody correct the KRLD (now KDFW) reporter who kept referring to Oswald as "Lee
Harold Oswald"?

As for the "Killing Kennedy" movie, I thought it was a big disappointment. It just seemed
to be a rehash of what both JFK and Lee Harvey Oswald were doing between 1959 and 1963,
and never more than hinted at anything more than the lone-gunman theory (except that Oswald
appeared to hate anyone he felt was trying to overthrow Fidel Castro). I still think the actual story
is far more complicated than this simplified version of the events of 11/22/63 showed.

As for the actors, I thought Rob Lowe did a reasonably credible job as JFK; I wasn't quite as impressed
with the guy who played Oswald. I think the best performance might very well have been the actress
who played Marina Oswald.

On a side note, I tend to agree with those of you who say that the JFK assassination will have been forgotten
in a few years, as those of us who were alive in 1963 slide into senior citizenship; college and high-school kids
today don't really seem to care much about it (although many of my students believe Oswald could have gotten
a fair trial in Dallas County despite all the publicity; I'm not sure he could have gotten a fair trial anywhere in this
country). For this generation, 9/11 is the defining, "where-were-you-when" event.

There are CIA documents which are supposed to be declassified in 2017, but the question arises as to whether
those documents have been tampered with, so how much new information they will give us is still open to question.
 
bpatrick said:
As for the actors, I thought Rob Lowe did a reasonably credible job as JFK; I wasn't quite as impressed
with the guy who played Oswald. I think the best performance might very well have been the actress
who played Marina Oswald.
Click to expand...

In case you did not know the names of the other actors you referenced, you could have checked the Internet Movie Database for their names (Will Rothhaar and Michelle Trachtenberg). Also I found the way you referred to their respective characters (Lee Oswald for Will Rothhaar and Marina Oswald for Michelle Trachtenberg) awkward since you referred to one of those characters by only his last name (or family name) before referring to the other character by both the same name in addition to her first name. This is a good example of why I prefer to refer to people by both their first names and last names (or family names) after the first references to them in writing.
 
searadiofreak said:
The most interesting part of the 50th programming is that this may be the last important anniversary of the assasination. Let's face it, most who were alive during this event are now approaching their 60's, or in their 70's and 80's. Like most media, the 60+ audience doesn't really matter anymore. The 75th anniversary will be even less interesting, and 100 years will make it Lincoln-esqe. These events have a way of dying out, in more ways than one.

The average 25-49 viewer has no recollection of this event. They may have some interest, but unless they lived through it they will consider it "history" that doesn't really reflect any hard interest.
Click to expand...

The average 50 year old was in diapers when JFK was assasinated. Also, 50 years is considered a watershed. I'm sure it will get some coverage on the 100th anniversary, but that's a long way off. Those interested in history will still pay attention, as I did to stories about Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and FDR.
 
Mario, if you had looked, you would notice that I did refer to Lee Harvey Oswald by that name once; I saw no reason to keep saying "Lee Oswald" over and over again, while I mentioned Marina only once. I don't know many writers who refer to a person by both first and last name at every mention of that person. But I agree that I should have checked the names of the actors who played Lee and Marina Oswald; in fact, they should have been burned into my brain since I saw so many promos for the movie. BTW, I have read some reviews for this movie that single out Michelle Trachtenberg's performance as possibly the best of the film.
 
Mario500 said:
What did you mean?
Click to expand...

I can't speak for nomadcowatbk, but my guess he means does CBS, NBC, or ABC have anything planned. Looking out at future Titantv listings, it looks like only NBC will have a prime-time special among the "old three". This is interesting because CBS has done numerous anniversary documentaries, I clearly remember the 20 year and 25 year (in 1983 and 1988) and videotaped them both. Will be interesting if CBS changes course and puts on something. ABC also has a 20/20 that night, so that could also become an opening. Interestingly, November 22nd also falls on a Friday this year, as it did 50 years ago in 1963.

Sidenote: Thanksgiving occured six days later that year, the latest Thanksgiving possible. Perhaps explains all the retailers that are going to be open on T-Day this year.
 
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bpatrick said:
On a side note, I tend to agree with those of you who say that the JFK assassination will have been forgotten
in a few years, as those of us who were alive in 1963 slide into senior citizenship; college and high-school kids
today don't really seem to care much about it [snip] For this generation, 9/11 is the defining, "where-were-you-when" event.
Click to expand...
I don't know what level you teach, but today's high school senior probably has no memory of 9/11 either, because he/she would have been 5 or 6.

My US history teacher in high school was about 15 when Kennedy was killed, and he bit into the conspiracy theories hook line and sinker. I'm probably not very interested because of how many times he showed us the Zapruder Film.
 
LKellerIII said:
The average 50 year old was in diapers when JFK was assasinated. Also, 50 years is considered a watershed. I'm sure it will get some coverage on the 100th anniversary, but that's a long way off. Those interested in history will still pay attention, as I did to stories about Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and FDR.
Click to expand...
Kennedy's would-have-been 100th birthday is coming up on May 29, 2017. I expect to see SOME mention of that date, as well.

How much coverage Kennedy continues to get will largely be determined by what, if anything, the Kennedy family does to keep their name in the news.
 
searadiofreak said:
Sidenote: Thanksgiving occured six days later that year, the latest Thanksgiving possible. Perhaps explains all the retailers that are going to be open on T-Day this year.
Click to expand...
I seem to recall that stores opened on Thanksgiving (at least Thanksgiving night) last year. And November 22nd is the earliest possible date for Thanksgiving. Retailers are simply rushing the season more and more each year.
 
I teach community college, which means I have students ranging from high school to middle-agers going back to college. While you may have a point about high-schoolers and younger not remembering 9/11, I have a fair number of students who do remember it (and for the record, I was eight when JFK was killed and still remember practically everything about that weekend).

As for specials, CBS has one this Saturday (Nov. 16) at 9/8; NBC has one with Tom Brokaw on Nov. 22 at 9/8. "Face The Nation" originates in Dallas Nov. 17 (Bob Schieffer, BTW, was with the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram on 11/22/63), and both ABC and CBS plan to originate their evening newscasts from Dallas Nov. 22.
 
firepoint525 said:
Kennedy's would-have-been 100th birthday is coming up on May 29, 2017. I expect to see SOME mention of that date, as well.

How much coverage Kennedy continues to get will largely be determined by what, if anything, the Kennedy family does to keep their name in the news.
Click to expand...

no Kennedy even holds on office in congress right now
 
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