Customer Reviews

JFK vs. Nixon [1960 Televised Presidential Debate]

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I have been a fan of the political arena as long as I can remember. Without question the Kennedy / Nixon debates were influential in helping a country decide who would be the next president. I doubt if the country would have been as impressed if they watched this DVD.

I am a sound FX engineer by profession, so I have a bias toward audio quality. There was no sound quality on this DVD, it was wretched, and it was unnecessary. Even the most rudimentary sound sweetening programs available today would have helped. But the producers took no recognizable effort to `help' the audio.

The picture quality, even though taken from sources some 40+ years ago, should not be this bad. The picture `throbs' at times from light to dark. Jump cuts gapping entire sentences of the candidate's response occur several times on the DVD.

Lastly, it is not the Nixon/Kennedy Debates; it is the Nixon/Kennedy DEBATE, singular not plural. Only one debate, the product description gave a running time of 30 minutes. The moderator, Howard K. Smith said the debate ran an hour.

I give one star. For purely historical purposes this would be worth owning. Sadly the producers efforts, or more correctly, the lack there of make this DVD practically unwatchable. If you are interested in the Nixon/Kennedy debates, do yourself a favor and avoid this disk. Find the content somplace else.