Customer Reviews

Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived

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4 star:		(1)
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I just saw this movie last night at the Beloit International Film Festival (BIFF) and I am still reeling. I was six months old when JFK was killed and frankly,embarrassingly,everything I've ever known about him has been related to me through others' opinions and glossy magazine articles discussing conspiracy theories, Camelot and Marilyn Monroe. I feel like I just took an incredibly interesting history course, one that everyone should attend, including most certainly, our current and any future US governments. This film should be shown to every high-schooler, and followed up again, with every college student. What an absolute eye opener.

Great footage that tells the story of JFK's aims for peace, quite a contrast with all of his succeeding presidents.

After deeply studying the life and philosophy, both the pros and cons, of JFK for greater than 3 years , I believe this movie is one of the best. This movie embeds the sounds, struggles, and outlooks of the JFK peace keeping ability. War does have a horrible price but so does peace, except in peace no one bleeds but only human's can grow from needed conflict. JFK and American Democracy needed the Communist's challenge. Today, what country or what idea makes America stronger and hopeful that with external pressure, a slingshot of universal pleasure can take place for global liberty. We have come to a point to where we have small tea parties, instead of un-surrendering civil revolutions. We have terror groups, who can never be seen, but we fight a number count War on Terrorism. A war where news keep the American deaths silent but make sure to print foreign suicide deaths. Like Vietnam, more foreigners will die because of American involvement. 2 million Vietnamese died along with over 58,000 American troops, including my uncle. In this movie you will notice the numerous press conference JFK had done and the what seemed like half a hundred news reports. I will alway argued that our media has looked that other way and escaping the element of "PRESS." Pressure is how journalism, even when you don't want to hear it or it seems like a conspiracy, keeps a democracy able to survive.

I found this film to be very insightful. I appreciated how the director kept the narration to a minimum and allowed the bulk of the film's premise rest upon video and audio recordings of President Kennedy and various other officials and world leaders. I feel that I have learned a great deal about Kennedy's presidency from this film that I had not been exposed to before.

I highly recommend this film to those who, like myself, who were not around to witness these events as they occurred. Minimal background in history is needed to understand the film. It may prove less interesting to those of us who witnessed these events, although the clarity of hindsight may make some events new to even those viewers old enough to recall Kennedy's presidency.

I'm a bit of a history buff, and one of the most interesting "what ifs" of my lifetime is what would have happened in Vietnam if JFK had not been assassinated in 1963. This documentary does an extraordinary job of looking at that question. Highly recommended.

Of all the films made about President Kennedy, none has ever given me a more intimate and almost visceral feel for the great and relentless burden upon his shoulders. Nor have I ever admired him as greatly as I do after watching Virtual Kennedy, after appreciating how steadfastly he resisted the push by his military advisers, the Republican Party and the media to go to war. A position which I believe clearly resulted in his death.

Six times he resisted the drums of war, in just a thousand days. Having told the Joint Chiefs of Staff that he plainly and simply was not going to commit ground troops to Vietnam, period, this film makes the argument (along with recent books who look at the question) that it's almost inconceivable to imagine Kennedy sending in troops... it would have flown in the face of everything this man had stood for, had expressed both publicly and privately, and it would have gone against his very deep knowledge of international affairs, world history... not to mention his understanding of battle, having been there himself.

A beautifully produced film with an ocean of press conference footage seldom if ever seen, and presented in long pieces so as to appreciate the President's body language, facial expression and most of all the anguish in his eyes as he attempted to answer questions from the media without giving details that he knew he could not reveal.. No flash-pow MTV editing here - this film was made by grown-ups.

If you're looking for the usual fawning, celebrity idolatry of Camelot, this film is not for you. But for those who seriously want to understand the man and why he was taken from is, Virtual Kennedy will be an essential part of your video library. And it will leave you with an unusually profound sadness, not simply as is usually the case over his death (we don't need another video to open those wounds again, in that for most of us of a certain age those wounds have never healed.) Instead one is reminded of and mourns the horrendous price we paid as a nation for our ego and our ignorance.

I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS DVD, VIRTUAL JFK: VIETNAM IF KENNEDY HAD LIVED.
THIS WAS A WELL THOUGHT OUT & THOROUGHLY RESEARCHED DOCUMENTARY, WHICH ALLOWED THE VIEWER TO HEAR JFK IN HIS OWN WORDS, IN AUDIOTAPE SPEECHES AND IN MANY ARCHIVED TELEVISIED PRESS CONFERENCES, WHICH THANKFULLY, HAVE BEEN SAVED IN THE VAULTS OF TV AND NEWS ORGANIZATIONS AND THE KENNEDY CENTER.

MANY HAVE OFTEN WONDERED WHAT JFK WOULD HAVE DONE WITH THE VIETNAM ISSUE. WOULD HE HAVE FALLEN INTO THE SAME TRAPS AS LYNDON JOHNSON, WHOSE OWN PRESIDENCY SEEMED TO BE CURSED AS THE SHADOW OF KENNEDY'S ASSASSINATION LOOMED LARGE OVER THE WHITE HOUSE FOR THE REMAINDER OF THE 1960'S.

THE PRODUCERS OF THIS DVD DOCUMENTARY DID NOT PUT WORDS INTO KENNEDY'S MOUTH WITH RESPECT TO THE QUESTIONS OF HOW HE RESPONDED OR WOULD RESPOND TO VARIOUS MILITARY CONFRONTATIONS. JFK'S MANY PRESS CONFERENCES REGARDING CUBA, BERLIN, RUSSIA AND VIETNAM WERE WELL DOCUMENTED. IN ONE OF THE LAST STATEMENTS JFK EVER MADE ABOUT VIETNAM BEFORE HIS MURDER, HE REPLIED TO REPORTERS THAT THE U.S. WAS NOT GOING TO FIGHT A WAR IN VIETNAM FOR THE PEOPLE OF SOUTH VIETNAM.

JFK SAID THAT THE PEOPLE OF SOUTH VIETNAM WERE GOING TO HAVE TO STAND UP FOR THEMSELVES AGAINST COMMUNIST NORTH VIETNAM, THAT IT WAS THEIR STRUGGLE TO WIN OR LOSE. IN THE 1960'S, VIETNAM WAS A COLD WAR TRAP SPIDER WEB FOR ANY AMERICAN PRESIDENT. JFK WAS LOOKING TO AVOID THAT TRAP AND NOT GET CAUGHT UP IN IT, ESPECIALLY IN LIGHT OF WHAT HAPPENED AT THE BAY OF PIGS. WHEN THE CONSPIRACY TO KILL KENNEDY SUCCEEDED, THE NEW PRESIDENT, LYNDON JOHNSON, MARCHED THE UNITED STATES RIGHT INTO THE SPIDER WED OF VIETNAM.

IN HIS OWN WORDS, JFK STRUGGLED AND FOUGHT TO FIND PEACEFUL MEASURES AND SOLUTIONS TO THE OMNIOUS PROSPECTS OF WARS THAT COULD KILL 100'S OF MILLIONS OF PEOPLE. THE VOICE-OVER NARRATION ON THIS DVD IS SOLID AND HELPS TO BRIDGE THE KEY SCENES OF KENNEDY'S PRESIDENCY IN THOSE TURBULANT EARLY 1960'S.

I NEVER REALIZED HOW HARD THE PRESS WAS ON JFK UNTIL I SAW THIS DVD. AT EVERY PRESS CONFERENCE, HE HAD HIS SHARE OF JOURNALISTS WHO ACTED MORE OR LESS AS CYNICAL AND SKEPTICAL DETRACTORS, WHO TRIED AND TRIED TO KEEP JFK ON THE DEFENSIVE. HE CERTAINLY HAD HIS PLATE FULL, DEALING WITH CASTRO AND CUBA, WHICH WAS A THORN IN HIS SIDE AND THE ALWAYS MANIPULATIVE AND TROUBLE-MAKING RUSSIAN COMMUNISTS, CERTAIN ROGUE CIA AND FBI ELEMNETS AND THE U.S. JOINTS CHIEF OF STAFF. WHO WERE SKEPTICAL OF JFK'S LEADERSHIP ABILITIES AND WILLINGNESS TO WAGE WAR.
GET THIS DVD AND SHOW IT TO AS MANY PEOPLE AS POSIBLE.

55,000 AMERICANS DID NOT HAVE TO DIE IN VIETNAM. SCORES OF OTHER VETERANS DID NOT HAVE TO COME BACK MAIMED OR BE IMPRISONED IN POW CAMPS. IF PRESIDENT KENNEDY HAD LIVED, I TRULY DOUBT HE WOULD HAVE MADE THE SAME MISTAKES LYNDON JOHNSON DID. IT IS A SHAME THAT ROGUE ELEMENTS OF THE C.I.A. JOINED FORCES WITH THE MAFIA, CUBAN EXILES AND VARIOUS FACTIONS OF THE MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX AND TEXAN OIL BARONS TO COMMIT TREASON AND MURDER PRESIDENT JOHN KENNEDY THAT DARK DAY IN DALLAS. JOHN KENNEDY, IN ONE SENSE, WAS A VICTIM OF THE TIMES IN WHICH HE LIVED IN.