Executive Action

I think the first belief in a conspiracy in the assassination of John F. Kennedy happened a few second after the shots were fired in Dealey Plaza. Those beliefs have not subsided fifty years later--I think I read somewhere that a majority of people think that there was a conspiracy, though nothing has been proven.

I'm still on the fence. I read a book some years ago called Case Closed, by Gerald Posner, that had me convinced that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. But the one thing that's always nagged at me is Jack Ruby--a man with ties to organized crime takes out Oswald, for the lame excuse that he wanted to spare Mrs. Kennedy a trial. I am dubious.

There have been a few films about the conspiracy, the most prominent being JFK, by Oliver Stone. But the first was 1973's Executive Action, directed by David Miller, with a screenplay by Dalton Trumbo. One of the credited story authors is Mark Lane, whose book Rush to Judgment is one of the seminal tomes on a conspiracy.

We've heard a lot of theories--the Mafia, the CIA, J. Edgar Hoover, Cubans, Lyndon Johnson, or a combination therein. This film posits that it is a right-wing cabal of former intelligent agents, politicians, and businessmen who, dismayed at Kennedy's left-leaning policies (namely, the nuclear test ban treaty, withdrawal from Vietnam, and sympathy for the black race) have decide to take "executive action" and assassinate him for the good of the country.

This is all set up very well. They meet in the home of Robert Ryan (it would be his last film). They are all the kind of guys you see at country clubs, true-blue Republicans, who wear suits and ties even in casual moments. We don't really know who they are, or what they do--it appears the the ringleader, played by Burt Lancaster, is a former black op specialist, and that Will Geer is a southern oil tycoon. He is resistant, but the others need him, presumably for his money. When Kennedy announces a withdrawal of troops from Vietnam, he's in.

They concoct a plan using Lee Harvey Oswald as their patsy, and in precise detail we see how they framed him, using a double (they also prefigure Oliver Stone's claims that the famous photo of Oswald with his gun was faked). One of the unnamed conspirators has ties to the White House, for he says he will convince the right people to take the motorcade through Dealey Plaza, including making a nonsensical sharp turn that takes the car right by the Texas Book Depository.

The film is interesting, and has a chilling aspect, even if the conspiracy theory is a fantasy. Trumbo writes this so well that we feel it easily could happen. Of course, the suspense isn't really there--at times I imagined someone stopping them, but of course we know that won't happen.

There are a few bizarre problems--how did a man who did not work at the Depository manage to walk right in, unseen, and take his place by the window? The film shows the conspirators watching the motorcade on television, but of course it wasn't televised, making the Zapruder film so important.

There are people who spend their entire adult lives studying the assassination, without coming to any solid conclusions. I think, with time and the deaths of so many involved, this will remain an unsolved mystery. But Executive Action, at a trim ninety minutes, would make a good double-feature with JFK.