While Parkland may have a seemingly interesting plot, the film is unfortunately poorly directed, poorly shot, and poorly written. One of my biggest issues was the film’s implementation of the actual footage of the JFK assassination into the movie’s scenes. Whether this was a stylistic choice or a decision that was made due to laziness or budget constraints, I have no idea. I do know, however, that by using actual footage from the assignation, it made the casting decisions regarding JFK, Jackie Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson seem mistaken. At first I assumed that the director would decide to make JFK, Jackie Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson “faceless characters” due to the way that they purposefully obscured the character’s faces throughout multiple shots in the film, however, I was mistaken in this assumption upon seeing them decide to add strange shots that almost lingered on the character’s faces for no reason. The strangest thing about all of this is that they kept jumping from obscuring the character’s faces, to showing the character’s faces. It was almost as if they couldn’t decide if the characters should be “faceless” or not! I did find that there were a few other shots throughout the movie that I feel were filmed poorly, but these were the most notable.
While Parkland may have a seemingly interesting plot, the film is unfortunately poorly directed, poorly shot, and poorly written. One of my biggest issues was the film’s implementation of the actual footage of the JFK assassination into the movie’s scenes. Whether this was a stylistic choice or a decision that was made due to laziness or budget constraints, I have no idea. I do know, however, that by using actual footage from the assignation, it made the casting decisions regarding JFK, Jackie Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson seem mistaken. At first I assumed that the director would decide to make JFK, Jackie Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson “faceless characters” due to the way that they purposefully obscured the character’s faces throughout multiple shots in the film, however, I was mistaken in this assumption upon seeing them decide to add strange shots that almost lingered on the character’s faces for no reason. The strangest thing about all of this is that they kept jumping from obscuring the character’s faces, to showing the character’s faces. It was almost as if they couldn’t decide if the characters should be “faceless” or not! I did find that there were a few other shots throughout the movie that I feel were filmed poorly, but these were the most notable.
