Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived (DVD)

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It´s a simple enough question, but it´s one that´s at the root of virtually every fictional story ever written or told. What if? also impacts the real world when policy makers run multiple scenarios to determine the wisest course of action: "What if we aren´t greeted as liberators?" "Oh come on, don´t be ridiculous!"

What if? has also spawned its own branch of history labeled by some as "virtual history." In the tradition of alternative history literature, virtual history begins with real-world events then asks "What if?" a certain critical inflection point had played out differently.

In "Virtual JFK" the central question is "What would the U.S. have done in Vietnam if Kennedy had lived?" The program is based on a book by James Blight, janet M. Lang, and David A. Welch. Blight serves an on-screen interlocutor guiding us through the crucial policy decisions of the Kennedy administration.

Like any good academic, Blight grounds his argument in rigorous research. He takes the viewer step by step through a series of real-life crises to demonstrate how JFK reacted to each of them from the Bay of Pigs to the Laos Crisis to the Cuban Missile Crisis. In each case, Blight argues, JFK was heavily pressured by his advisers (including the legendarily bellicose Gen. Curtis LeMay) to go to war and, in each case, refused to commit U.S. troops.

The program consists largely of White House tapes and lengthy press conferences which provide evidence that we once had an independent, functioning press. The reporters grill Kennedy over and over again, barely hiding vicious accusations with the claim that "It has been reported that…" Granted, they also fawn over JFK the celebrity and his lovely wife but these guys would have been locked out of the Bush or Obama press corps a long time ago.

After walking step-by-step through each of these crises, Blight concludes that, unlike President Johnson, Kennedy would not have committed to war in Vietnam. And… that´s about it. No, he wouldn´t have. End of program. We came all that way just to resolve a question that can be answered in about five seconds?

When I interviewed Blue Hadaegh and Grover Babcock, directors of the great documentary "A Certain Kind of Death," Mr. Babcock said that one of the primary questions he asks himself before shooting a documentary is "Why does this need to be a film? Why couldn´t this be a feature piece in the New Yorker or the L.A. Weekly?"

"Virtual JFK" may be a fine book but as a film, it has little to offer beyond the historical value of the JFK press conferences that comprise much of the running time. Director Koji Masutani tries valiantly to make this a visually compelling film (opting for an Errol Morris "Fog of War" style) but is ultimately hamstrung by subject material which doesn´t lend itself to an on-screen treatment. For an exercise in virtual history, there is surprisingly little speculation offered. Instead, Blight and his co-authors show one example of another of JFK´s preference for diplomacy and restraint. That´s sound research, but as a movie we get the point the third or fourth time around. By the sixth case study, it´s more like listening to a lecture than watching a film. That would actually have been a better approach. I think it would have been fascinating to listen to Professor Blight lecture for an hour and a half. The straightforward approached has certainly worked for Noam Chomsky in several documentaries. But this middling approach is just a drag with no payoff.