JFK: The Smoking Gun (2013)

Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

So after Oswald fired his first shot, Hickey identified that JFK was shot, looked up at the 6th floor, reached down for the AR-15, lifted it from his car floor, released the safety, turned the rifle toward JFK rather than the 6th floor, and accidentally shoots JFK.And he does all this in under 6 seconds! Yeah, right. The movie also doesn't talk about the type of bullet the AR-15 fires and if there is any indication of that bullet entering the back of JFK's head at the proper angle. This theory is so bad that I suspect it is a deliberate fake that can be proven wrong. I'm sure the assassination was a conspiracy, but not this.

It's impossible to only review this as a film and ignore the story--the theory about the assassination presented.As a film, the "actors" doing the re-created scenes were miserable. There was way too much repetition, making the film seem padded--to fill out the 2 hours including commercials.As to the theory--there are two reactions I had--chortling and shaking my head in amazement.We are supposed to believe that the third shot did not come from Oswald's gun, but from a rifle fired by accident by a Secret Serviceman sitting, rather, standing in the car right behind the president's car. Presented in the film is the notion that on hearing the first shot, this agent reached down and picked up a rifle on the floor, then when the car sped up after the second shot, the agent fell backwards and his rifle just happened to be fired by accident right during the portion of a second it was pointed right at the president's head.The unlikelihood of that happening is close to 100%. First of all, the agent would most likely have not had his finger on the trigger while he was holding the rifle up and looking around to see if he could spot a shooter. If he fell back and lowered the rifle, there would have been less than a second when it really was pointed toward the president at all.More significantly, IF this had all happened, there is no way in the world none of the other 9 people aboard (including agents on the running boards) that vehicle would not have reported hearing a gunshot from a couple of feet away. Certainly some of the hundreds in Dealey Plaza would have reported seeing and/or hearing a gunshot from the area of the car behind the president. Someone with a still camera would surely have photographed something to support this film's preposterous claim. The only photo showing him with a rifle was taken after leaving the scene of the shooting-which is when the agent says he picked up the rifle in the first place.The film makes a big deal about the autopsy claiming the entry wound on the final shot was reported as 6 millimeters, when the bullets from Oswald's gun were 6.5 mm. It never mentions that skin can contract after a hole is poked. It doesn't mention that the hole in JFK's neck wound--the one they agree came from Oswald's rifle--was measured as 4 mm. So much for that notion.They never mention that ballistic tests on actual human skulls found bullets of the type Oswald used often did shatter on impact and explode like the final bullet in the JFK shooting. Instead, they waste time shooting bullets into melons to demonstrate how some bullets will explode on impact more easily than others.Presenting only evidence that advances your claims and excluding facts known that contradict those claims is dishonest.The best part of this film is when they show how the shot that hit both the president and Governor Connelly could definitely have done so, because of the fact that the governor's seat was more toward the middle of the car than the president's--that there was nothing magic about that bullet hitting both men...it did not change course in mid-air as the conspiracy people have claimed.That comes early in the film. I advise anyone to switch channels after that portion and not waste their time (like I did) with the rest of this nonsense.

I am a JFK historian, relatively respected in the field and I LOVE a great JFK/Assassination film. Do I have opinions on the assassination? Of course. I wouldn't be much of a historian if I didn't. However, I consider myself incredibly open minded and am not opposed to any new information that may change my ideas or theories because the truth is none of us know what happened that day and sadly/most likely never will. However, this latest documentary will do NOTHING to further that investigation. This is ridiculous. I have read Mortal Error, the book that this is based on, and as silly as I thought the concept was I actually thought the book made some valid points and interesting ideas. The documentary though is quite simply silly. It is slapped together, is 99% recreations that are B-Movie quality at best. The actors are unintentionally parodying the entire situation with terrible representations and Warren Commission testimonies that are laughable. The dramatic music, the horn rimmed villain, the melodramatic pleas for justice...its silly and if they meant this to be taken seriously, they fail miserable.Interestingly enough most of the cast in the film aren't listed on IMDb meaning they were probably friends and family which explain a lot. This is a grievous error if they were trying to be taken seriously. The woman who portrayed Jackie Kennedy briefly should be barred from every performing again and she never even speaks. Alex Ivanovici is a decent narrator to the story. He certainly has the right voice and his raspy melodramatic tone fits the documentary if you can call it that. Our lead investigator in the film is interesting enough and seems to have a decent personality and actually feels like he is taking this seriously. Fortunately for the film he is the one aspect of the film that doesn't feel schlocky but they don't use him very often considering he's the focus of the entire investigation. The first part of the documentary is far more interesting as they cover familiar ground for most JFK historians but they do it will with diagrams and computer recreations. I actually quite enjoyed the first half of the film considering it was all rehashed material.I also thought the directing of the film was pretty solid too. Malcolm McDonald has had a fair amount of experience doing documentaries and it does show. He turns a really awful idea and some terrible recreations into a reasonably watchable joke. The beautiful scenes of Dealy Plaza and the melodramatic investigation scenes fit the film and make it at least mostly entertaining. It's the last 1/4 of the film when they suddenly spring on you where this concept is going and what they think happening that it becomes laughable. Most of what they say makes no sense at all even at the most rudimentary level. Some, if not all, of the Warren Commission testimony is paraphrased or completely made up. Some of it I literally can't find a single piece of documentation on and yet they are spouting it as fact. I don't believe there was a single actual interview with any real person but rather terrible recreation after terrible recreation. I hate to be insulting to anyone that enjoyed this but I felt like this was severely dumbed down and by far one of the least intelligent JFK documentaries I have ever seen and I've seen dozens. This one is barely passable as morbid entertainment and that's about it. 6/10

I watched the documentary JFK: THE SMOKING GUN and it was very disturbing. Yes, it was compelling and convincing that the bullet that explored JFK's head was from a different weapon other than the rifle LHO supposedly used. It was also very compelling that one of the secret agents in the car immediately following JFK fired that lethal shot. But to further say and conclude that the agent, George Hickey, did so "accidentally" is silly and an insult to normal intelligence. In that same show it was revealed that Robert Kennedy asked the agents, "Did you kill my brother?" Even RFK himself sensed this was an "inside" job.McLaren's teary eyed and choking statement at the end that this really was a "tragic accident" was, to me, contrived and phony. What was the premise and goal of this documentary? It only raised more questions than to put "closure" on the matter. If it attempted to shut out all conspiracy theories it failed. In fact it opened it up all the more.One thing is obvious. If the project or action to assassinate JFK was to "kill" him, it blatantly failed. JFK is much more alive now than ever. That bullet in Dallas did not terminate him, on the contrary, it immortalized him, made him "eternal".