Kissinger & Nixon
by Daniel Petrie
(Click here)
Canada
Product details
Actor: Beau Bridges, George Takei, Kenneth Welsh, Ron Silver, Ron WhiteDirector: Daniel Petrie
Producer: Brian Leslie Parker
Producer: Daniel H. Blatt
Producer: Jon Slan
Producer: Judith James
Producer: Lionel Chetwynd
Writer: Lionel Chetwynd
Writer: Walter Isaacson
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Original Language), Analog
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
Running Time: 97 minutes
Release Date: 1998-02-10
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Publisher: Turner Home Ent
Studio: Turner Home Ent
VHS Movie Reviews of Kissinger & Nixon
Movie Review: Animal Husbandry versus U.S. President
Summary: 5 Stars
This nonfiction work on both Kissinger and Nixon is hard to believe that it really happend. I am 12 years old and wasn't alive when either one of these guys was President (I guess Kissinger was just Vice-President). When plutonians entered my grandma, you could tell right away with the glowing eyes and all of the messages and stuff that she could put in my brain. And then Kissinger also had a grandma and he also wasn't from the U.S. So, it is so obvious that Kissinger and Nixon were both plutonians and with the Chinese proton rays that make Viet Nam look like a summer camp, none of us should be surprised with stuff like AIDS and malaria and stuff like that. It is dumb to think that Nixon or Kissinger would mislead us about communism and Viet Nam. 12 men may make a jury, but NapLOO Diano knows what really makes electrons on stuff light up the sky (hint: telepathic tables don't float in my house!). Our dog ate about a pound of candy one christmas, and he shook like crazy and made a mess on the floor just like what plutonians do to Americans. We shouldn't put up with men like these and someone should track down Nixon and make him go to jail. Kissinger is a pretty good guy and I think maybe they left him and now are in someone else. It has been very dark lately.Movie Review: A COMPLEX SUBJECT HANDLED WELL.
Summary: 4 Stars
Lionel Chetwynd's excellent script, based largely upon Walter Isaacson's biography of Henry Kissinger, cogently limns a primary motive for President Nixon's National Security Advisor's desire for ending American military involvement in Vietnam: desire for private power. The film essentially addresses that period in 1972/3 when Nixon and Kissinger worked together, despite obvious tension between them, to bring the war to an end. The President did not want a peace settlement until directly before the 1972 election in order to enhance his chances of winning by a landslide, but Kissinger organized top-secret peace talks in Paris with both Vietnamese governments, raising a question as to his true goal in crafting an accord - peace or personal popularity? When negotiations among representatives from Washington, Saigon and Hanoi fail, bombing of civilian targets in North Vietnam follows, and we sense that Kissinger is opposed to such an action, since his espousal of earlier bombing attacks is not mentioned. Political machinations throughout the negotiation period engaging Nixon's staff, and the Pentagon, are well-drawn in a soundly organized script. Veteran director Daniel Petrie leads with his customary skill and periodically intersperses, to good effect, actual wartime footage amid the main element of this work: realpolitik. Although he has sporadic difficulty with emulation of Kissinger's Teutonic accent, one could not wish for a better characterization than that provided by latex bedaubed Ron Silver, who obviously not only studied but mastered the future Secretary of State's mannerisms. Skillful Matt Frewer answers the call, in this very well-cast production, as General Alexander Haig, and his performance is splendidly nuanced, in no small part due to Petrie's careful direction and the fine editing of Stephen Lawrence. Capable acting turns also come from Beau Bridges as Nixon and Canadian Ron White as H.R. "Bob" Haldeman, yet it is Silver's delivery of the line "I will bring peace despite all this deceit around me" which a viewer will recall as an example of the curious irony which marks this well-wrought film.
Movie Review: My guilty pleasure
Summary: 4 Stars
Along with Oliver Stone's feature film "Nixon", this TNT made-for-TV flick is one of my most passionate guilty pleasures. This is not a great film by any standard. It lacks star power, the acting is mediocre, the script seems hackneyed, the history has been called into question by scholars all over the place, and the Vietnamese portions of the film are completely unbelievable. Still, this movie is one of my greatest joys. Why? I went to college during the Nixon presidency and Watergate. I was a college student during Nixon's invasion of Cambodia in 1970, which precipitated the riots that resulted in the killings at Kent State University. I was still in school when Spiro Agnew resigned the vice presidency and Nixon was forced to depart or be impeached. Never mind what kind of student I was! For I witnessed this history as a 20-something American trying desperately to avoid going to Vietnam and trying just as desperately to outlive the more Orwellian aspects of the Nixon presidency. What I like most about this movie and "Nixon" is the way they portray the vulgar political realist Richard Nixon became when in the White House. His family didn't like the opening scene where he calls Henry Kissinger "Jewboy". They didn't like all those scenes in "Nixon" where he called people (including the late FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, a known homosexual) some kind of "sucker" either. But these portrayals helped paint a portrait of this conflicted president as someone driven by history to fulfill a destiny only he envisioned. The rest of us saw the decline of democracy and a cheapening of the political system that wasn't as threatened until the days of Bill Clinton's sexual escapades and lying. For these reasons, I enjoy watching this movie over and over and re-living a part of my youth now long in the past. Even if this doesn't portray your youth, the movie reflects a time in American history when our future was uncertain and we had the most severe doubts about our national leadership. It is precisely this time in American history that laid the groundwork for an actor to take over the White House and, almost laughably, be considered in some quarters as deserving a place on Mount Rushmore. So watch this flick and you'll see not only why Nixon was a dolt, but why people thought Reagan was such a genius. Neither extreme is justified, of course, but you'll have fun watching Nixon choose to select the all-star baseball team over discussing the Paris peace talks with Kissinger. I think I'd have rather done that, too!Movie Review: Kissinger and Nixon and the complexity of politics
Summary: 4 Stars
I've never followed the history of Henry Kissinger until recently. Now I'm determined to learn as much as I can. Perhaps that's because he's so much in the news these days. Perhaps its because I just saw a documentary film about him that painted him as an evil war criminal. And perhaps its just because I just want to know everything.This 1995 Turner Classic video focuses on the Paris peace talks in 1972 and the roles of Kissinger and Nixon to try to bring the Vietnam war to a conclusion. It stars Ron Silver as Kissinger and Beau Bridges as Nixon. Both look ridiculous in their mask-like makeup. And both try hard, and sometimes succeed, in stepping into the shoes of the characters they represent.
The Richard Nixon represented here is arrogant, rather stupid and yet politically savvy - his only feelings about the Vietnam War being how it affects his upcoming election. He's surrounded by his Wasp cronies with whom he drinks bourbon and makes secret plans, which are targeted to make Kissinger come out as the bad guy. The Henry Kissinger represented here noticeably winces at Nixon's constant anti-Semitic remarks, eats pastries instead of drinking hard liquor, and is lonely despite his dates with Hollywood actresses. He's the stereotyped Jewish intellectual who is left out of the real power decisions.
As in other made-for-TV movies, the script is over-acted, over-simplified and one-dimensional. They even depict the leaders of North and South Vietnam as speaking English with their own over-simplified political agendas. It did, however, teach me a bit about history and about the hard choices that had to be made which include the fact that everyone knew that when the Americans pulled out, there would be a bloodbath in South Vietnam. The script did hold my interest however. Also, as far it went, it was a small introduction about the hatred between Kissinger and Nixon and the complexity of politics.
What is the truth, however? A lot of questions surface in my mind. Nixon comes across as the villain in this film. But Kissinger is currently being vilified in the press. What really happened at the Paris peace talks? Surely, the answer lies somewhere outside the realm of these films. I plan on learning more, but sometimes there just doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day to do it all.
Yes. I recommend this film. I recommend them all. Especially if you're interest has been raised in seeking the truth.
Movie Review: Impressive
Summary: 4 Stars
I'm probably not alone here, but I must confess that I often use politically themed movies as a bit of a history lesson. There are always going to be certain caveats that one must keep in mind--political bias, dramatic license, etc. But if one remembers that what one is viewing is indeed a fiction, usually some essential truths are revealed. In this case it would be the level of animosity that existed between Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger. The Amazon critic above describes it as a "love/hate relationship with emphasis on the hate." I'd go further than that. In this film, there is little evidence of ANY love (lost or otherwise) between these two powerful men.It's hardly surprising that as paranoid a politician as Richard Nixon mistrusted Kissinger. And his privately referring to him as "my Jewboy" has been reported before. But this film makes clear that Nixon was ready and eager to rid himself of his superstar advisor as soon as the war was over. Beneath all the politicking and conspiring is an undercurrent of jealousy which characterized Nixon throughout his entire political career.
Director Daniel Petrie, who had previously won an Emmy for "Eleanor and Franklin," steers his actors beyond caricaturization (so easy a trap to fall into with figures like Nixon and Kissinger) and moves gracefully through a somewhat formulaic script. Scenes of backrooom politicking in Washington ring true, although those between Asian politicos (both in North and South Viet Nam) do not. The scriptwriters seem to understand the dynamics of Washington politics quite well, but end up portraying their Asian counterparts as being alternately inscutable or just American-style politicos with an accent.
The film is very well cast. Ron Silver is impressive as Kissinger, and Beau Bridges is surprisingly effective as Nixon (who would ever have thought?). The other actors, who play less well known figures in the Nixon adminstration, have an easier time of it, although Matt Frewer's Alexander Haig doesn't quite jibe with the image we came to have of the general during the Reagan yers. As portrayed, he's almost, well, sensitive, and certainly conflicted over his "double agent" status within the administration. Now that's where I need a further history lesson. The Haig I thought I knew seemed as Machiavellian as the next guy. Maybe Turner Broadcasting will tackle him someday.
Summary of Kissinger & Nixon
A dramatization of the relationship between Kissinger and Nixon during the six-month period in 1972-73 when Kissinger was negotiating an end to the Vietnam War and Nixon was grandstanding politically.Biography Video
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