Parkland **** (2013, James Badge Dale, Zac Efron, Jackie Earle Haley, Tom Welling, Colin Hanks, David Harbour, Marcia Gay Harden, Ron Livingston, Jeremy Strong, Billy Bob Thornton, Jacki Weaver, Paul Giamatti) – Film Review

Writer-director Peter Landesman’s 2013 American historical drama film Parkland re-creates the events that occurred after the 1963 assassination of John F Kennedy.

A stellar cast is lined up for this ‘you-are-there’ realist-style recounting of the chaotic events at Dallas’s Parkland Hospital on the day US President John F Kennedy was assassinated. It focuses on the ordinary folk whose lives were affected that terrible day of 22 November 1963 and show how they re-acted. The movie is out to mark the 50th anniversary.

The ordinary folk include Kennedy’s doctors and nurses, assassin Lee Harvey Oswald’s mother and Abraham Zapruder, the man who has unwittingly captured the killing on his 8mm camera.

Extremely stylish done, Parkland is a great snapshot of this awesome moment in time. At times you almost think you are watching a documentary it feels so real. The film is a hugely atmospheric mood piece, with an impeccable period sense and vibrant feeling for its subject.

Landesman said the film does not set out to explore conspiracy theories about the assassination. With no new take nor inside information, its purpose and intentions are a bit mystifying, but it is still an involving, impeccable piece of film-making. Best to sit back and let it all wash over you. With the period and factual detail splendidly re-created, it is poignant and nostalgic to a rare degree.

Outstanding are Paul Giamatti as Zapruder, Billy Bob Thornton as Dallas’s chief of the Secret Service Forrest Sorrels and Marcia Gay Harden as head nurse Doris Nelson. These actors are always extraordinary, and they are again here, but they inhabit the ordinary folk territory perfectly. Only Zac Efron, maybe a bit too starry to fit into an ordinary folks ensemble, doesn’t seem quite right as junior doctor Dr Charles ‘Jim’ Carrico.

Zapruder’s footage became the most watched and examined film in history.

It is the first film directed by Peter Landesman, who became a figure of controversy when his New York Times article about sex slaves was accused of being partly fictitious. Landesman also writes the urgent, coherent screenplay from Vincent Bugliosi’s 2008 book Four Days in November: The Assassination of President John F Kennedy.

The main cast are James Badge Dale as Robert Edward Lee Oswald Jr, Zac Efron as Dr Charles James ‘Jim’ Carrico, Jackie Earle Haley as Father Oscar Huber, Tom Welling as Secret Service Agent Roy Kellerman, Colin Hanks as Dr Malcolm O Perry, David Harbour as James Gordon Shanklin, Marcia Gay Harden as Head Nurse Doris Nelson, Ron Livingston as James P Hosty, Jeremy Strong as Lee Harvey Oswald, Billy Bob Thornton as Secret Service Agent Forrest Sorrels, Jacki Weaver as Marguerite Oswald, Paul Giamatti as Abraham Zapruder, Dana Wheeler-Nicholson as Lillian Zapruder, Bitsie Tulloch as Marilyn Sitzman, Kat Steffens as First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, Gil Bellows as David Powers, Sean McGraw as President Lyndon B Johnson, Rory Cochrane as Earl Rose, and Mark Duplass as Kenneth O’Donnell.

It is produced by Playtone’s Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman, Bill Paxton, and Exclusive Media’s Nigel Sinclair and Matt Sinclair.

Production began in January 2013 in Austin, Texas, and the hospital scenes were filmed in a building on the campus of Austin State Hospital.

© Derek Winnert 2013 derekwinnert.com