JFK: America's Last President, WUSA

JFK warned of the danger of a comfortable complacency: The barrage upon truth will grow more constant. And some people cannot bear the responsibility of a free choice which goes with self-government. Finally, shrinking from choice they turn to those who prevent them from choosing and thus find in a kind of prison, a kind of security. We, as a society, have lost the spirit we held when John F. Kennedy was our president.Today, those who question power are considered conspiracy theorists. But where did that term originate? While there was a minimal reference to the term “conspiracy theory” in the first half of the twentieth century, it was not used in a derogatory way. The term became ubiquitous in the late 1960s after the CIA distributed a memo encouraging its assets to use the term to belittle anyone who questioned the Warren Report. The Declaration of Independence was essentially a conspiracy theory document, accusing King George of many things, some of which he was guilty, others not. Our country was born in the spirit of questioning power, John F. Kennedy embodied that spirit, and it died with his assassination. Today, we celebrate fitting in, not standing out. We honor those that follow the established and approved narrative, not those that offer opposing perspectives. Not since John F. Kennedy have we had a president who genuinely worked in the public’s interest. He was thoughtful, intelligent, and empathetic. He tried to create a fairer society, he tried to raise the living standards of the many, and he tried to create opportunity for all. He respected self-determination and abhorred imperialism. He was the president of the people. His presidency was one of those rare shining moments in history when the common man was actually represented in the halls of power. America died on November 22, 1963, and what remains is an illusion. As Robert Kennedy wrote in his book To Seek a Newer World, “Sharp criticism often goes hand in hand with the deepest idealism and love of country.” We have the right to demand better. And we once did have better. We had a president who genuinely served our interests—and not only our interests but the interests of the common man all around the globe. We are still living under the system that allowed these murders to be perpetrated, and that system is even more entrenched today. —America's Last President: What the World Lost When It Lost John F. Kennedy (2022) by Monika Wiesak 

WUSA is a perfect example of what could be labeled “liberal nightmare” cinema in the form of an abstract political artifact. A garish example of liberal exhibitionism. Stuart Rosenberg over-directed this under-written story of a right-wing political plot in New Orleans, based on an obscure novel by Robert Stone (A Hall of Mirrors, 1967). Paul Newman here is an alcoholic who drinks because he can't face himself. He's married but estranged from his equally alcoholic wife. Joanne Woodward's character is an uneducated young widow and a former hooker. Also, Anthony Perkins is an idealist going mad, and Cloris Leachman is a crippled naïf. First, I have to confess I have a fundamental aversion to movies about beautiful women whose souls have been lost, stolen or destroyed, especially when it isn't clear why. Paul Newman said he wanted the film served to critique “corporate greed” and “apathetic indifference to our national future.” 

Paul Newman plays Rheinhardt, a failed musician turned into a radio newscaster who becomes intrigued by Geraldine (Joanne Woodward), maybe falling in love with her. Geraldine befriends Morgan Rainey (Anthony Perkins), a social worker who is duped by a sinister neo-Fascist radio-station operator: Bingamon (Pat Hingle). Anthony Perkins plays an addled idealist, while Bingamon uses the burn-out Newman as his cat’s paw on his WUSA station. The score by Lalo Schifrin occasionally overwhelms the dialogue, and a late scene in which Newman's Rheinhardt delivers a harangue against the Vietnam War is difficult to hear because of the music—which I can only guess is supposed to mirror the riot that’s occurring onscreen.

In short, WUSA is a mess - but a fascinating mess, that ends in the most overtly manipulative tear-jerking way imaginable. The truth is there aren't enough politics in WUSA. The film is hobbled by an emphasis on too many wounded or compromised characters. Even the hippies living down the hall turn out to be shameless opportunists who take a gig singing at the right-wing rally, and then they slip their stash into Geraldine’s purse when the cops arrive. But WUSA is strangely fascinating in its complete defeatism. Nothing is ever really stated outright and instead the viewer is left to infer what's going on. It serves as a scrapbook of American sensibility at the end of the 1960s, a time when there really were people who believed we were on the brink of a revolution, when it was not difficult to imagine that the cycle of political assassinations and conflict begun in Dallas in 1963 would not only continue, but would escalate catastrophically. —Deeper Into Movies: Film Writings (1969-1972) by Pauline Kael

"At the movies, we are gradually being conditioned to accept being shown acts of violence. The directors used to say they were showing us how ugly it was in order to sensitize us to its horrors. You don’t have to be very keen to see that they are now in fact desensitizing us. They are saying that if everyone is brutal, the heroes must be as brutal as the villains or they turn into fools. There seems to be an assumption that if you’re offended by movie brutality, you are somehow playing into the hands of the people who want censorship. But this would deny those of us who don’t believe in censorship the use of a counterbalance: the freedom of the press to say that there’s anything conceivably damaging in these films—the freedom to analyze their implications. If we don’t use this critical freedom, we are implicitly saying that no brutality is too much for us—that only squares and people who believe in censorship are concerned with brutality. How can people go on talking about the dazzling brilliance of movies and not notice that the directors are sucking up to the thugs in the audience?" —The Age of Movies: Selected Writings of Pauline Kael (2016) edited by Sanford Schwartz 

WUSA was a giant flop in 1970 and the film was lost to history, barely remembered as a footnote to Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward’s careers. Despite its high-quality stack of actors and ideas, WUSA never delivers on its promise to become a political thriller. The screen time spent in examining the rootless characters played by Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward seems unrelated to the story's center of interest, the barely-glimpsed conspiracy. Geraldine sees herself as too dumb for working for a phone company and is quite antisocial. When Rainey goads Rheinhardt to show a conscience about the deal-making he sees back at the WUSA station, the DJ's response is to turn hostile. 

As much as Rheinhardt's disenchantment and apathy may reflect reality, it only frustrates the audience that expects Newman's character can find his moral footing and stop being so passive. WUSA belongs in the company of other "conspiracy" thrillers like All the King's Men, A Face in the Crowd, The Manchurian Candidate, Network, The Candidate, Executive Action, JFK, and Bulworth. Either way, these movies all envision a political environment beholden to corporate interests, a mass media run by capitalist sharks who manipulate the public opinion through demagogues, and an electoral process where candidates are stripped of their ideals in order to gain power. Director Stuart Rosenberg fails to bring WUSA to anything resembling an articulate conclusion. Rheinhardt's hippie neighbors are allowed to entertain at the rally, an unexplained choice that makes little sense. Rheinhardt is finally about to speak against WUSA when gunshots ring out. Later, Laurence Harvey's preacher advises Rheinhardt that the WUSA group is finished and that they'd all best leave town. In reality, it would make more sense that the publicity from the attempted assassination would actually strengthen Bingamton's circle of power.  

Critics of the time acknowledged WUSA's parallels to earlier political films like Frank Capra's Meet John Doe but blamed its failure on an aimless script and Rosenberg's limp direction. The film's passive-apocalyptic tone has more in common with Nathanael West's novella The Day of the Locust. A committed anti-war protester, Paul Newman was added to President Nixon's "unfriendly" list. Newman and Woodward did their best to promote WUSA and were complaining about Paramount's limited support for the film. In at least one interview Newman hinted at political interference, explaining that Rosenberg had been forced by the studio to cut over 20 minutes. But a decade later, Newman's final verdict was that WUSA was "a film of incredible potential which the production loused up. We tried to make it political, and it really wasn't." The DVD offers no subtitles and no extras. This is a shame, as several critics hinted that Robert Stone's Bingamton character was based on oil tycoon H.L. Hunt, who in the 1950s backed a syndicated conservative political TV show called Facts Forum. Hunt is also frequently named in several conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Source: parallax-view.org