A Thread about the film JFK

And your asking me if I'd read your argument wasn't condescending bullshit iyo? think again.

Aimless, chill out. You tend to do this.

Suppose for a moment if I asked you whether you'd read my posts, Alfred. I think JD got the kind of answer he deserved.

if you don't want to be asked that question, then maybe don't pop up out of nowhere to go "lol" and dismiss an argument as unconvincing while making no attempt to engage with it. pretty simple!

anecdotally j.d. is correct that if someone in the wild's talking to me about oliver stone's jfk it's always because they're telling me they'd never be taken in by such poppycock, but i wasn't talking about it in 1991.

iirc the HSCA's conclusion was based on quite a technical dealey-acoustics argument and not one that's stood up well since. nevertheless i don't know if citing them-- especially in an argument specifically about "why" these awful infowars sheeple don't believe the warren report-- is a "look what this learned body concluded!" move so much as an "even these guys couldn't repeat the official story w a straight face" one.

anyway surely they are disdained by true assassination heads for their (v funny) conclusion that while it was a conspiracy it definitely did not involve any of the people you're thinking of, no matter who you are.

pop up out of nowhere to go "lol" and dismiss an argument as unconvincing while making no attempt to engage with it.

I 'popped up' just like anyone else who has contributed to this thread, so that's a bit of rhetorical trash. And going 'lol' and dismissing a post is such a frequent occurrence on ilx, I could probably cite thousands of examples. But I won't.

Lastly, as for wishing my 'engagement with your argument', while that sounds noble enough I promise you we'd both find the exercise very tedious in the end. And it'd just piss off everyone else on the thread. That's why there are thousands of examples where others chose the same course I did. I did engage with your condescension. I should havbe spit out the bait. More fool I.

I’m tired! I want this thread back! You’re attacking this man because he’s a homosexual!

do me a favor and don’t read or respond to my posts from now on, aimless. this isn’t the first time you’ve had a bizarre overreaction to one of my posts and i’m fucking sick of it.

Both of them? Both brothers?

go to sleep!

goddammit i’ve been sleeping for three years!

You’re attacking this man because he’s a homosexual!

WHat?!? How could I do that if I have zero idea if he is a man or what his sexual preferences are? I've never bothered to find out and probably would forget if I ever knew.

And "attack"? You consider anything I have said as an a attack? I'm incredulous. This is getting seriously crazy now. Go do whatever it is you do when you aren't talking shit at me.

He was paraphrasing a line from the movie, dude.

So JFK

if it’s a suicide, i’ve seen weirder

oh man why dont you fuckin stop it?!

He was paraphrasing a line from the movie, dude.

― Precious, Grace, Hill & Beard LTD. (C. Grisso/McCain), Wednesday, 27 April 2022 bookmarkflaglink

Aimless indeed.

how's your mousse

The fuckin' posters don't even know! Don't you get it?

all I wanted in the world was to be a catlick priest

I have my doubts about this picture, boss...

Boss, maybe you're bein' too hahd on Aimless.

You are one stubborn sonuvabitch.

The cool kids table has met.

That is precisely the point of a long dining table. The splendor of the meal adds to the enjoyment of it.

I hope you like squab!

Aimless, JD, Eric H., The Mafia, keeps 'em guessing like some kind of parlor game, prevents 'em from asking the most important question: why? Why was King Boy Pato banned? Who benefited? Who has the power to cover it up? Who?

I played JFK Reloaded a bunch of times when it was released and my conclusion was - most of the people posting in this thread could have made the shot

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5U5iu85oUM

hey man i wasnt even IN dallas that day

Grassy knoll creeps

http://www.quartzcity.net/ilx/steelydan-grassyknoll.jpg

if yr not allergic to podcasts or to john ganz and his delivery and inablity to finish sentences lol here's the bouie/ganz "unclear and present danger" pod on jfk and the politics of its moment: https://open.spotify.com/episode/57rDv0n23lnQ5xZIob9wLr?si=0b23ffdca8a34fb0

i like ganz tho i get why some dont lol (he trolls a lot and he's irritably dismissive of ppl he thinks are idiots, some of whom probably aren't) and i like him partly bcz you can read him or on the podcast hear him thinking thru an idea that's just struck him in real time: here he gets a bit fixated on JFK being pernicious bcz (he claims) it mainstreamed a kind of conspiracy-centred mindset which he (correctly) thinks is bad for historical analysis and (also correctly) is inherently bad politics… where i think he overtstates the case is that this kind of thinking is always always always already a pretty constant pretty mainstream in american culture:
eg https://www.historytoday.com/archive/history-matters/illuminating-conspiracy

stone gets it mainly from the 60s counterculture of course, where it did exhibit some anti-war characteristics (important to his own personal psychodramas) -- this is primarily where the notion that it's a leftwing kneejerk comes from i suppose. QAnon is also marinated in 60s counterculture (and JFK-worship lol); it has curdled as it aged (and as difft wings of boomerdom learn to live with and exchange sensibilities that once clashed)

it occurs to me that cockburn's hostility to conspirary as a mode of analysis upthread at least partly reflects his (cockburn's) battles within the 70s counterculture to establish a politics less inclined to veer off towards reaction -- not that he didn't end up pushing bad CTs of his own in the end (e.g. he became a bit of a climate change truther iirc)

Ganz speedrunning a conversion to historical materialism as he worked his way through marxists.org was thrilling ngl

I will listen to that podcast, here he is on the Wes Anderson tweet (I haven't watched that film)

i didn't think the french dispatch was that good but i dunno about all that stuff about the fascioid carceral state and so on

— John Ganz (@lionel_trolling) May 1, 2022

yes he wrote a pissy review of it, i think for gawker

lol this film is so bad (i tried to rewatch it)

the truth is on your side, bubba!

I say "let justice be done, though the heavens fall"!

also i for the record: this is the only Stone movie i still truly, genuinely, enjoy & rewatch regularly

otm

you’re close. you’re closer than you think.

I still enjoy Keith David's soliloquy from "Platoon."

yeah there are things ~about~ Stone’s movies I still dig, the David speech, or Kilmer as Jim Morrison, or Juliette Lewis singing in the jail cell Natural Born killers … but i dont enjoy rewatching his other movies really at all because his DO YOU SEE tone always drowns out anything else that you might enjoy (imo)

JFK is the only movie that is actually served by, and is better because of his bombasity(?)

Isn't that do-you-see? tone pretty much embedded into every last line of Kevin Costner's? (Or at least him verbalizing his every thought as he tries to figure stuff out, which amounts to the same thing in the end.)

Dis is a coup d'etat. With Lyndon Johnson. WAITING. IN. DA. WINGS.

xpost yes! that’s what I mean! in JFK the “do you see” tone ~works~

a sensible take would be boring. you NEED the gesticulating-wildly, spittle-mouth red-faced craziness. that is part of the, for me, uh “charm” of this movie.

i dont usually like conspiracy stuff & i don’t think i even buy it with JFK that much

but at the same time, for me, with Kennedy there is just something about that world & the cast of characters & thd venn diagram of interested/wronged parties that i never tire of hearing about.

stone captures the wild parade of spooks & weirdos & i love love love it

i dunno

the wild parade of spooks & weirdos--agree that that's the best thing about the film, by far. Unfortunately--for me, anyway; I know I've made this point before on this thread--Costner stops the film cold every time he opens his mouth.

I don't know if don't-you-see is all over Nixon, which I love. I can think of at least one flagrant instance, when the Larry Hagman character is trying to get Nixon to run in '64; Nixon says no one can beat Kennedy, then some guy in the shadows says "But what if Kennedy doesn't run," and everybody exchanges knowing glances.

hoover watching w cruel satisfaction as leading racehorse unexpectedly collapses

dammit who cooked this steak there’s blood all over my plate

i know what hunt is; i know what he… TRACKS back TO (i actually like this a lot)

it’s the system!

Also the scene where Richard Helms's eyes literally turn black:

https://phildellio.tripod.com/cia.jpg

Yeah, I suppose do-you-see is all over Nixon too. But happily, no Kevin Costner.

Unfortunately--for me, anyway; I know I've made this point before on this thread--Costner stops the film cold every time he opens his mouth.

yeah but the sleaze would lose its thrill without true-hearted Ray Kinsella in the center of the film