A new National Geographic documentary revisits the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy on the 60th anniversary of his death, featuring colorized archive footage and never-before-seen interviews with the last living witnesses to the event.
“JFK: A Day in America” features testimony from the two Secret Service agents who protected the first lady, Jackie Kennedy, that day, November 22, 1963, a journalist riding on the White House correspondents’ bus and the colleague who gave a lift to gunman Lee Harvey Oswald that Friday morning.
“JFK was seen as a symbol of hope to so many people because of his ambitions for civil rights, sending a man to the moon, and the hopeful policies he tried to implement,” says the documentary series director. told Lusa, Ella Wright.
“He and Jackie looked like movie stars, they had enormous charisma and aroused fascination,” he continued. “They had global appeal, but were also very popular with Americans.”
The series will premiere in Portugal and the United States on November 5 on National Geographic channel, counting down to the 60th anniversary of the murder.
It is launching at a time when JFK’s nephew, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is leading an independent 2024 presidential campaign that is gaining traction. In a new Quinnipiac University poll released this week, “Bobby” Kennedy polled 22% in a three-way race, compared to 36% for Donald Trump and 39% for incumbent Joe Biden.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. does not have the support of a party apparatus, but the name recognition is so strong that the performance exceeds expectations.
This is one of the legacies that continues sixty years after the day that changed the course of history, “the day America lost its innocence,” according to one of the secret agents interviewed.
“The testimony was incredibly vivid and visceral. Everyone we spoke to still feels a very strong emotional connection to what happened to them,” said Ella Wright. “Age has intensified the experience.”
In three episodes, the series shows a different side of the murder in Dallas, Texas, and its consequences for the country and the world.
“We were interested in people who had an inside story and could tell us what it was like to be there,” Ella Wright said. “We didn’t want analysts,” he summarized.
The National Geographic team worked with the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza – located where Lee Harvey Oswald shot him – to colorize parts of the archive for the first time.
The process was carried out in collaboration with a colorization company in France, which employed a team of historians to ensure color accuracy. “It was important that there were no barriers between the film and the audience,” Wright said. The result is an image that looks much more contemporary than the black and white videos of the time.
That was the goal, the director explained. “We wanted to create an immersive experience and make people feel these events like they’ve never felt before.”
The series provides historical context and Ella Wright recognizes the parallels between the situation America experienced in the 1960s and the situation it experiences now: highly polarized, extremely divided over civil rights and social issues.
However, the way the episodes are put together is neither retrospective nor a comparative analysis. The angle is that of the present moment, where the audience is taken into the events minute by minute as if it were a real-time documentary.
“A lot of documentaries focus on conspiracy and are very analytical. Our mission was different,” emphasizes Ella Wright. “We wanted to take people into the past and make them feel what it would be like to experience these events in 1960s America.”
The parallels in polarization blur in other aspects, which reflect a different society. For example, the weapon is carried by hand to the third floor of the police station and Lee Harvey Oswald, accused of the assassination of the president, gives a press conference. “These are things that I found incredible and very symptomatic of that time,” the director said.
On the other hand, the team wanted to tell the family tragedy and the “courage” of Jackie, who was at her husband’s side when he was shot in the head. “It wasn’t just the president of the United States who died, it was a husband and a father.”
Sid Davis, a White House correspondent at the time, says that when Vice President Lindon Johnson was sworn in, they asked Jackie Kennedy if she wanted to change because her dress was covered in blood. She replied: “No, show them what they did”.
“It’s such a powerful statement and a testament to her bravery as she watched her husband be murdered just hours ago,” Ella Wright said.
“I would call the impact this had a tragedy. More than any documentary I’ve worked on, this is incredibly emotional,” the director emphasized. “The emotion we see in the archives speaks for itself. It’s something that really influenced people and continues to do so.”
Source: DN
