301: Chappaquiddick

[00:00:00] Chapter 13, Random Film. Let's get into Chappaquiddick from 2017. This one is directed by John Curran, Curran, sorry if I'm saying that name wrong, stars Jason Clark who I really like, Kate Mara who I really like, Ed Helms, Bruce Dern, Jim

[00:00:19] Gaffigan, Olivia Thurlby, and the synopsis is, depicting Ted Kennedy's involvement in the fatal 1969 car accident that claims the life of a young campaign strategist Mary Jo Kopechny. Going into this, I, and it's

[00:00:35] still now, I really am fascinated by the Kennedy family as tragic as it is and I think that's why a lot of people are interested in it because there's so much as I said tragedy in that family especially in the 60s both with JFK,

[00:00:48] with RFK, and then with this situation with Ted Kennedy which I knew nothing about going in and to give you a little bit more background and I don't know exactly what has been dramatized or changed but the overall story in this

[00:01:03] is Ted Kennedy was in a car accident, he was driving, and that strategist that's mentioned in the synopsis actually drowned and he didn't report the accident for about 10 hours from what I understand and basically got away

[00:01:21] scot-free due to a number of reasons which that leads me to the main point of the movie is it does a fairly decent job of showing how politicians, people in government with a lot of power, a lot of political power, wealth can through

[00:01:39] connections, through whatever else, can get away scot-free in the worst sorts of situations as Ted Kennedy did to at least a certain degree even though obviously we know about the story now and it did tarnish his reputation for a while it

[00:01:53] was largely swept under the rug and I think that's a pretty still sadly relevant idea when it comes to people of power and people in politics and Jason Clark who he really has grown as an actor I think I was talking about him

[00:02:09] recently with something else but he has really grown as an actor he's done such a wide variety of roles some people hate on him I love him really I don't think he's to the levels of maybe the absolute top tier a-list actors but

[00:02:21] he's a pretty great character actor and has become a pretty great leading man too so I think he's excellent in this as Ted Kennedy Kate Mara very underrated doesn't always pick the best projects but I really really like her in this she's just not in the movie enough

[00:02:38] it is one of those stories that most people when you think of the Kennedys think of JFK first and then RFK and Jackie Kennedy so this is one that's sort of the third on the list of sorts and I guess I can see that but still

[00:02:54] very worth learning about because I was very curious about this one when I heard it was about the Kennedys and so if you are interested in that family in that period and political scandals or anything along those lines it is worth

[00:03:08] checking out and learning about I would be curious to read books about the situation I guess one other thing that not to say that how they presented this movie was bad but I kind of would be curious to

[00:03:22] see despite her dying a movie presented from Mary Jo's perspective in terms of we're only seeing it from his perspective obviously he's the one who survived and yet it would be kind of curious to see that kind of timeline

[00:03:36] through her eyes at least partly because it's mostly just on Ted Kennedy and that's alright I understand it's logical but yet it would be kind of cool to see and enlightening to see something from her side as much as it could in terms of

[00:03:51] realism because she obviously did die other than that good performances it looks quite good I really like the setting and the location up north not one of the best Kennedy movies like I would watch JFK the Oliver Stone movie I

[00:04:08] would watch Jackie Natalie Portman film that one is amazing probably my favorite out of any of them there's a good show called the Kennedy's with Greg Kinnear and Barry Pepper that's awesome so there's a lot of great content out there

[00:04:22] definitely some duds for sure this one is somewhere in the middle it's possible I like it like I would watch it again I've seen it three two times at this point and I do like it it is worth watching just not an amazing movie not

[00:04:36] one that blows me away and doesn't go into things as deeply as it could but it still does present a very sort of unsettling perspective on how politicians work and what they'll do and how carefree they can be in terms of

[00:04:49] presenting and protecting their image and just throwing other people away no matter their relationship to them or anything like that so it is a good cautionary tale of sorts that one is a three and a half out of five