25 Greatest Warner Bros Movies Ever
23. JFK
Who says that history films have to be historically accurate? Certainly not Oliver Stone, that's for certain.
Like fellow Warners release All The President's Men, JFK is all about the appeal of the procedure and the enchantment of the chase, picking away evidence from untruths and rumours to find the best possible truth.
For Stone, that best possible truth wasn't necessary the same as what actually happened, but his commitment to cutting an entertaining story out of the original marble slab turns a good courtroom drama into something essential. It's incendiary, swaggering and bursting with the kind of bravado that comes with a film-maker trying to challenge a presidency.
It's not really the best advert for restraint, but then sometimes auteur film-makers should be allowed free expression, even when they take mammoth liberties with the truth.