False Witness by Patricia Lambert Page B

apparent authenticity.
    Actual film footage, some of it quite moving (Walter Cronkite fighting for composure after announcing President Kennedy’s death and the wrenching images captured on Zapruder’s home movie), was woven together so seamlessly with recreations that it is difficult at times to separate the two. Stone’s blurring of that line intensified the movie’s documentary-like quality, the sense that this is
the real thing
. But the chief reason for that impression is its real-life protagonist. Stone tried to deflect criticism about his choice there by claiming the man on the screen was “a fictional Jim Garrison who is dealing with facts. And, sometimes, speculation.” 4 But audiences experienced the screen version as an accurate portrayal, or a close facsimile. The movie wouldn’t have worked otherwise. The American people didn’t want some screenwriter’s fantasy about the assassination. They wanted
the truth
. Stone understood that, for it was what he, too, wanted. He couldn’t deliver it but whether or not he realized that initially, or if he ever did, is unclear. What is clear is that he knew how to make a film that
appeared
to deliver it.
    Those who had not spoken up beforehand weighed in now.
    â€œStone went too far,” said former Texas Governor John Connally, who was wounded in the Dallas shooting. “This was a national tragedy. [Stone] mixed fact and fiction in such a way that he’s going to convince practically every young person that the federal government, their own government, conspired to kill an American president. And I think that’s evil, frankly.” Connally ridiculed the sheer size of Stone’s conspiracy, which he called “ludicrous.” President George Bush, on tour in Australia, responded to a question by saying he had seen “no evidence” that the Warren Report was wrong but didn’t think Stone should be censured for putting his own spin on the assassination.
Newsweek
published an eight-page cover story that labeled the film “propaganda.” Two former aides to President Lyndon Johnson joined the fray. Joseph A. Califano, Jr., writing in the
Wall Street Journal
, said that
JFK
was “a disgraceful concoction of lies and distortions.” Jack Valenti, now president and chief executive of the Motion Picture Association of America, waited until after the Academy Awards balloting * to denounce the film as a “smear” and “a hoax” on the order of Leni Riefenstahl’s Nazi propaganda film
Triumph of the Will
.
    The most serious objection was voiced by Brent Staples in the
New York Times
who pointed out that “historical lies are nearly impossible to correct once movies and television have given them credibility.” Echoing Governor Connally, Staples predicted that “the children of the video age will swallow JFK whole.” He noted that policing art “for inaccuracies” was an impossible task and the best that society could do was to “denounce” such history as “bogus.” 5 The harshest words came from Washington columnist George Will. Stone, he said, was “an intellectual sociopath, indifferent to truth” who combined “moral arrogance with historical ignorance.” The film he called “execrable history and contemptible citizenship.” 6
    As debate on the subject inundated the country, talk radio and television commentators jumped into the fray; university symposiums and town hall meetings were held to discuss the controversy, and it quickly escalated into the most extraordinary war of words ever exchanged over a movie. What was missing in that great debate was
Clay Shaw
. Except for a few muffled voices in New Orleans, virtually no one spokein his defense. No national figure uttered his name. Everyone was focused on the grand conspiracy. No one seemed to care about Shaw’s reputation, his fate, or how it came to pass. No