This film is opening in Vancouver tomorrow. I haven't a clue what sort of release it's getting in the States. Does anyone here know if it's worth seeing? And by that, I do not mean whether the film is "good"; rather, I am wondering if it contributes anything to the current political debate or to our understanding of Kerry in generall. It could be balanced biography or it could be hagiography (it seems unlikely it would be all that critical of him), it could be full of truth or an entertaining pack of lies; all I wanna know is if it's worth seeing, to help keep abreast of what's goin' on.

I thought it was worth seeing.

The film focuses on Kerry's efforts with Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW). It has a biography of Kerry that includes basic childhood information and then goes into a little more detail about his time on a Swift Boat (including the famous/infamous bronze and silver stars) but it spends most of its time talking about his antiwar efforts with other Veterans -- specifically the Winter Soldier Investigations and the five days the Veterans spent on the mall trying to get in to speak before Congress.

Whether or not it's relevant to Kerry as he is today... I think so, but I'm positive others will disagree. It does paint a striking image of who he was *then*, and I think it does so effectively. It gives an alternate and coherent view from some of the allegations put out by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth -- whether or not that's useful or relevant depends on how important you think the allegations are, I guess.

Public education in the US tends to stop teaching history just after WWII, if Vietnam is mentioned at all it usually focuses on the Chicago riots. VVAW is mentioned as a footnote, if at all. The information on the Winter Soldier Investigations (including footage taken of soldiers testifying to the atrocities they'd committed) and the bacstory and coverage of the five days on the mall, ending with the soldiers throwing their medals/ribbons/whatever they had over the barricade was very interesting.

Today was the film's last day in Vancouver, so I caught it.

Interesting bit of hagiography -- certainly not the sort of film that is interested in UNDERSTANDING the character or the issues around him in any complex or meaningful way. For example, there is no acknowledgement anywhere of the fact that some of Kerry's fellow veterans deeply resent his remarks about the "atrocities" in Vietnam -- a term that Kerry himself has regretted using -- because this gave their captors just that much more reason to abuse them in prison; and there is no indication anywhere that there is some debate nowadays over whose medals, exactly, Kerry threw over that fence in Washington, and whether Kerry was as forthcoming about the details of that event as he should have been. The film also completely sidesteps some of the controversies, e.g. the 'Christmas in Cambodia' affair, by ignoring those aspects of Kerry's once-official biography altogether.

And I believe there is a line early on about the "honesty" of the Baby Boomer generation -- spoken by Max Cleland, I think? -- that sounded awfully self-congratulatory, especially considering it is juxtaposed with JFK's we-will-defend-liberty-everywhere-on-the-planet speech, which really ain't all that different from the sort of global-democracy agenda that Bush has been pursuing for the past few years. (And come to think of it, Andrew Sullivan has written a couple of interesting articles about the similarities between JFK and Bush.) Indeed, are not JFK and his globally-minded ideals partly to blame for getting America involved in Vietnam to begin with? To see this film, you would think Lyndon Johnson was solely to blame; but then, I guess he was from Texas, whereas JFK was from Boston, and that's all we really need to know, isn't it.

Apart from that sort of subtlety, the only remotely relevant nod to present-day politics is the inclusion of a few scenes concerning John O'Neill, who was apparently picked by Richard Nixon and Chuck Colson to oppose Kerry's anti-war efforts. (I wonder what Colson now makes of Kerry, who he referred to back then as a "demagogue"?)

Interesting to see this film so soon after Unfinished Symphony, though there isn't all that much overlap between them, actually. It's kinda bizarre to think that I was born when all that stuff was going down -- to think that my parents brought me into the world while having to deal with all that upheaval -- and I'm quite glad I didn't have to live through it myself. Should I have kids of my own in the near future, I can only imagine how our current struggles will look to them.

I was also surprised to find that Philip Glass wrote the music for this film. I was thinking that whoever had written the music must have wanted to emulate the tunes written for Errol Morris's The Fog of War, and lo and behold, the composer on this film wasn't a copycat -- it was the same guy!

If anyone wants to see this film, they can download it legally for free from www.thekerrymovie.com.

Alan Thomas wrote:
: I didn't realize there was any debate: Kerry kept his medals, throwing the ribbons
: only. At least that's what was clearly stated on Frontline this week.

This week, yes. But apparently statements of Kerry's back in the '70s left one with the impression that the medals he threw (which he now says belonged to a friend of his) were his, too.