robbo7 I'm usually no conspiracy theorist, princess diana, 9/11 all i can say is yawn but this is very different, nobody no matter what they say knows for certain what happened on that day, other than president kennedy and john connolly were shot, how many shots,how many shooters, who did the firing,Did Oswald act alone,did he fire any shots, was he in fact on the 6th floor at that time,the magic bullet truth or fiction? so all these and more are questions that still have not been conclusively proved either way.The film certainly is not the standard 'toe the official line' and treat the public like little children fair usually dished up when discussing this particular episode in American and world history, by the mainstream media, who are prepared to air the latest claptrap about princess diana, michael jackson and 9/11 CTS, but always shy away from even questioning the events leading up to nov 22 1963... the movie has some good acting and is at least occasionally prepared to move away from the WC bible although predictably it ends up coming back onside.So to end a good movie but we are still awaiting a truly definitive movie to be made about this enduring mystery man named lee harvey oswald.

dtucker86 I have always been a JFK assassination buff and remember seeing this movie when it first premiered on ABC when I was nine years old. The people who made it owe no apology. How many of us have wondered what might have been if history had been different. In this movie, the question is what might have happened had the world's most infamous assassin not be murdered in Dallas. It REALLY would have been the trial of the century. Henry Wade was the district attorney in Dallas at the time. He prosecuted Jack Ruby and his name is on the famous Supreme Court abortion decision, but just think fate denied him the chance to be the greatest prosecutor in history! The man who convicted Oswald. This movie is so realistic that I had to keep reminding myself that this trial didn't actually happen. I guess this is the greatest compliment you can pay. It opens with Oswald in his specially built Hannibal Lector-like cell in the Dallas county jail sometime in 1964. The radio announcer says he has been on trial for his life for the last 43 and the jury has now retired. The jury then comes back and we see the world's press rushing to their phones and Oswald being handcuffed and taken back into the courtroom to hear his fate. It then flashes back to the events of November 21-22 1963. We see him trying to reconcile with his estranged wife Marina who has been staying with a friend and then the next day he is driven to work at the School Book Depository with a mysterious package in the back seat. Then America's darkest day happens, I wanted to point out that for 1977 the assassination reenactment is very graphic, there is just no explosion of blood at the head shot that killed Kennedy. Oswald leaves the Depository, murders officer Tippet (we are to infer) and then is arrested. It then flashes ahead to him being tranferred to the county jail where a flashbulb explodes and then the fantasy starts. Jack Ruby wasn't there and he is driven off. The rest of the movie details his trial with wiley, sarcastic prosecutor Ben Gazzara versus bombastic defense attorney Lorne Greene. Actually I think it would have been better if the roles had been reversed. I can't take TV's beloved Daddy Cartwright defending one of history's most infamous criminals. The trial is handled very well as I said earlier. Lots of courtroom theatrics (I object and such). Greene with Perry Mason ease demolishes several witnesses. That is the rather ridiculous part of the film. In one part Greene cross examines the witness who took Oswald to work and saw him carry a package he said contained curtain rods into the building. He has him carry a similar package that does contain curtain rods. It should be pointed out that in real life, the Dallas police went over the Book Depository with a fine tooth comb. They found the brown wrapping paper, but no curtain rods. It then flashes ahead to an assassination reenactment at the Depository itself, something they actually did in real life. Greene is scolded by the judge for telling the jury there "might" have been a gunman on that there grassy knoll. All throughout this fantasy, Oswald is as big a man of mystery as he was in reality. Scenes show him going to Russia and associating with sinister individuals. Was he a patsy, a conspirator or just a lone nut? Maybe SPOILER ALERT He clams up on the witness stand when Greene tries to get him to come clean and then erupts chillingly when Gazzara uses an unusual cross examination technique. Did Oswald decide to kill Kennedy because he felt Marina was attracted to him? Stranger theories have been proposed! SPOILER ALERT. MAJOR SPOILER ALERT!!!! I am disappointed at the conclusion and think the filmmakers lost heart. Read these words backwards if you want to really know how it ends: alone ours is verdict final the and jury only the are we screen the on flashes it Ruby by shot then is he verdict the hear to led being is Oswald while conclusion the at.Despite this, it is a great film. Vincent Bugliosi, the Manson prosecutor recently wrote a massive study of the case and said that in real life ANY jury would have convicted Oswald and sentenced him to death. There was just too much evidence.

tvlnow I saw this movie as a kid and then watched it from a library copy a week ago.Since my original viewing I have intensely studies the various conspiracy theories, including the Federal Government's conspiracy theory: that a lone nut gunman who happened to be a USMC, Russian speaking defector, with US Naval Intelligence credentials, who flew back from the USSR at the height of the Cold War on a state department ticket, to repatriate in the US without a passport, who enjoyed the company of virulent right-wingers, assassinated the President with a Manlicher-Carcano (known as the Italian "humanitarian" rifle during WW2 because its barrel rifling was so bad) that he bought mail-order from Chicago, when he could have bought something better from just about anywhere in Texas back in 1962.Yeah, these conspiracy theorists are real whack jobs.Watch this movie to stoke the fires of your interest in discovering the truth. And don't let anyone call you a liberal or leftist just because you won't swallow the propaganda.Think for yourself.This movie is a good place to start.

Ddey65 As I stated in my comment regarding JFK(1991), I'm not willing to dismiss any conspiracy theory regarding the Kennedy assassination, unless it's completely devoid of facts, such as in Oliver Stone's propaganda piece. Somebody criticized it for echoing the Warren Commission report, but I don't think this movie supports the Warren Commission's line at all, in fact it offers the possibility of other groups who might've wanted Kennedy dead, including the Ku Klux Klan, who is rarely considered despite the fact that they were so determined to kill in order to resist an integrated south.What we all have to remember that this is pure fiction, since Oswald never lived to go to trial, and Robert Thompson never implied that it was the truth, unlike Oliver Stone who firmly believes his left-wing rhetoric, and expects us to do the same. This TV-Movie and the play it was based on offers all kinds of speculation of who else may or may have not worked with Oswald. Even die-hard believers in the Warren Commission have to accept the fact that Oswald SAID he was a patsy. Was he telling the truth, or was he just trying to throw the spotlight off of himself? Just what would've happened if Jack Ruby never killed him on live television, can only be speculated by all sides. At least Thompson tried to give us something to consider.