"JFK" (1991)

Credits run in counterpoint through a 7 to 10 minute sequence of documentary images setting the tone of John F. Kennedy's Presidency and the atmosphere of those tense times, 1960 through 1963. An omniscient narrator's voice marches us through in old time Pathe' newsreel fashion.

School kids reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. WPA films of farmers harvesting the Texas plains. Rain, thunderheads, a dusty car coming from far away on a road moving towards Dallas. Cowboys round up the cattle. Young marrieds in a church. Hillsides of tract homes going up. The American breadbasket, the West. Over this we hear Eisenhower's address. As we move into the election campaign of 1960, we see the TV debates, Nixon vs. Kennedy, Mayor Daley, Kennedy victorious...

Against this is juxtaposed other forces: segregation, J. Edgar Hoover, military advisors, Castro, Marilyn Monroe, Lumumba... three frames of the Zapruder film counter-cut... ending with the Kennedy inauguration and the irony of Earl Warren administering the oath as he will Kennedy's eulogy.

The beach, the bombardment, the rounding up of prisoners, Kennedy's public apology, Allen Dulles standing next to J.F.K., both uncomfortable with the small talk...

Cuban rallies, footage of training camps, espionage activities, boats, cases of weapons, Robert Kennedy... John Roselli, Sam Giancana, Santos Trafficante, Richard Helms (the new CIA chief), Bill Harvey, Head of ZR/RIFLE, Howard Hunt...

Khrushchev, Kennedy, Castro on television, meetings with Cabinet, Russian vessels in Caribbean, U.S. nuclear bases on alert, civilians going to underground safe areas... the Russian ship turning around, the country smiling...

Closing down Cuban Camps, McNamara speaking, Khrushchev and Kennedy, the "hot line" telephone system inaugurated, Kennedy with Jackie and children sailing off Cape Cod... Vietnam introduction, early shots, Green Berets, counterinsurgency programs, De Lansdale, leading up to the Test Ban signings... then J.F.K. at American University, June 10, 1963.

Diplomats at the United Nations... Adlai Stevenson, Castor... Martin Luther King and the March on Washington (a snatch of his "I Have a Dream" speech)... Bobby Kennedy and Jimmy Hoffa going at it... U.S. Steel Chairman's remarks in the steel face-off, men going to courtrooms with briefcases,... Teddy Kennedy, Rose, Joe, the Kennedy family, all teeth and good looks... and of course John campaigning, always campaigning, shaking hands, smiling, that supremely warm smile and sense of grace and ability to convey to crowds their oneness with him... forever... culminating in the more specific Texas shots... with Jackie in San Antonio, and Houston... then at Fort Worth... then at Love Field moving through the clouds toward the Dallas/Forth Worth plain which suddenly breaks into view as we descend...

A moving car carrying two Cuban males disgorges a rumpled, screaming woman, Rose Cheramie, a whore in her thirties, lying there bleeding in the dirt. The car drives off.

We see Rose, badly cut but quite lucid, trying to reason with a policeman, Lt. Fruge, and a doctor - in a remote black- and-white documentary.

We see the last close-ups of Kennedy shaking hands on the tarmac at Love Field, smiling, into the motorcade... the downtown streets of Dallas, people packing the sidewalks clear back to the buildings, hanging out of windows ten stories up, schoolgirls surging out into the street in front of the car. The President is wildly popular - except for the occasional posters calling for his arrest for treason...

We see a massive overhead shot of the Plaza as it lay then. Credits conclude under shot - and we have the subtitle "November 22, 1963."

A young epileptic screams and suddenly collapses near the fountains in front of the Texas School Depository. He has a violent epileptic fit that attracts surrounding attention. Dallas policemen run over to him. We hear the siren of an ambulance roaring up.

TIMECUT TO ambulance loading the epileptic man and taking off.

BACK TO a montage of the shooting. We see Kennedy, in the last seconds, waving, turning the corner at Houston from Main... We see TV footage and a piece of Zapruder film from before the shooting; fragmented images...

CUT TO stages shots of crowd people looking on. The images are grainy to match the tone of the Zapruder film. People are on rooftops, hollering. The crowd is wild with enthusiasm. We pan past Jack Ruby and slam into him in black- and-white. The camera shows a Cuban man with a radio; a man with an umbrella; subliminals. Through open windows on the fifth floor of the Criminal Courts Building, convicts watch and holler from their jail cells. We see the sixth floor of the Texas Book Depository with open windows and a vague blur of a figure and a rifle.

The clock on the Hertz sign reads 12:30.

A motorcycle officer paralleling the Kennedy car tries to use his radio.

It's jammed. The sound of the jammed Dictabelt drives the rest of the sequence.

We see Zapruder, a short middle - aged man, shooting his 8mm film from the Grassy Knoll, and then we see Jackie Kennedy - floating on film, her voice, high, soft:

The camera rests on Jackie for a beat, and then we see the shot of the little schoolgirl skipping on the grass.

CUT TO the approaching overpass. J.F.K. waves... Mrs. Connally turns to J.F.K. The shot is crazy, fractured, surreal.

Then we hear the shots: the volley sounds like a motorcycle backfire. We catch a glimpse of a muzzle flash and smoke. We see a view from the street of the Texas School Book Depository - all in line with the "official" version of events. Pigeons by the hundreds suddenly shoot off the roof. Then the screen goes gray as did CBS TV's first bulletins to the country.

We hear voices under this from everywhere, colliding in confusion and horror:

We hear sirens and screeching tires. The screen is still gray, randomly intercut with the end of the Nix film showing the car escaping. There are wildly tracking shots of the crowd running towards the Grassy Knoll.

The camera pans up the little set of stairs. We see more faces.

Someone in a suit stops our camera. Secret Service?

We see the briefest glimpse from the Zapruder film. The camera moves in on the open umbrella next, then to the freeway sign, then to Mrs. Kennedy out of the car reaching for help, then to the agent rushing onto the rear fender. The car finally speeds away. The people on the other side of the underpass wave at the oncoming hearse from hell. (These are fragmented, mystifying shots. The main effect is one of blackout - of not knowing; of being in the dark, as we all were back then.)

Pause. The lovely old china clock on the wall reads 12:35. Somewhere a car backfires. We see a close-up of the clock moving to 12:36. We hear the sound of a pen on paper, scratching... We see a shot of Jim Garrison as a young air pilot in World War II; hear the sound of airplanes. The camera moves to framed photos of Jim as a young, Lincolnesque lawyer... we hear sounds of political rallies, cheering... a shot of Jim's grandfather shaking hands with President William Taft. The sound of bulldozers carries us to a shot of Jim staring at piles of decaying corpses at Dachau... a photo of Clarence Darrow... a law degree and an appointment as District Attorney of the New Orleans Parish... Mother Garrison with young Jim on the desk... another family - his own. We look across the thick desk with the chess set, A Complete

Works of William Shakespeare and a Nazi helmet with a bullet hole in it... to Jim himself writing - pen to paper. We sense the quiet intellect of the 43 year old man. The clock ticks in the awful suspended silence.

It's as if the air itself has been sucked from the silent room. This is the last moment of peace before the World will rush through the door in all its sound and fury - to change his life forever. The camera haywires into a close- up of Jim as he looks up... and knows.

Lou Ivon, Jim's chief investigator, is already standing there in the room. He is burly, in his 30s - his expression universal for that day.

Jim is stunned. His look of horror and shock speaks the same language as on faces all across America that Black Friday.

Jim gets up, heading rapidly for the door.

The midday customers all stare solemnly at the TV set high in the corner of the cafe. The manager, ashen, serves drinks to Jim and Lou.

We are told a bullet entered the base of the throat and came out of the backside, but there is no confirmation, blood transfusions are being given, a priest has administered the last rites.

They all look up, expectant, as Walter Cronkite interrupts on the TV:

There are sounds of shock, muttering, some sobbing in the restaurant. Lou gulps down his drink. Jim sits stunned.

He holds back the tears. The food comes. Lou waves it off. They just sit there.

Katzenjammer's is an Irish working class bar across Canal St. In a seedy area near the Mississippi River, just off Lafayette Square.

A variety of loud Irish working men sit on stools watching the TV. There are a few formica tables with chairs against the walls, and an unused pool table.

On the TV, we see the scene at Dealey Plaza. The reporter has several men, women, and children gathered around him. He puts his microphone in their faces.

CUT TO the picket fence above the Grassy Knoll.

CUT TO the Book Depository.

CUT TO the County Records Building.

Back in the bar, the camera moves to two patrons seated at a table by themselves, far enough away not to be heard. Guy Banister is a sturdy, imposing ex - FBI agent in his 60's, steel gray hair, blue eyes, ruddy from heavy drinking. He wears a small rosebud in his lapel. Jack Martin is a thin, mousy man in his mid - 50's, wearing a Dick Tracy hat.

They're both drinking Wild Turkey heavily. The TV blares loudly across the room over their voices.

Several hours have elapsed. The clientele has grown, drinking, watching the tube with the insatiable curiosity the event engendered. People stare in from the street... There is a silence in the restaurant.

TELEVISION INSERT: image of a Dallas policeman hauling a Mannlicher - Carcano rifle with a sniperscope over the heads of the press gathered in the police station.

We see images of the textbook boxes - the sniper's nest in the sixth story of the Book Depository - and then the view out the window looking down at Elm Street.

CUT TO Newsman 2 at a different location or in studio.

Police are saying there could be a tie - in here to the murder of the President.

TELEVISION INSERT: Lee Harvey Oswald, a bruise over his right temple, is apprehended at the Texas Theatre.

TELEVISION INSERT: Oswald is booked at the station. A surly young man, 24, he claims to the press:

The room bursts out with an accumulated fury at the young Oswald - a tremendous release of tension. On the TV we see the excitement in the newsmen's eyes; they all sense that this is the break they're looking for in the case.

Garrison and Ivon watch the TV, and then Garrison stands and pays the bill.

As they leave, the camera holds on the image of Oswald.

The sun is setting through thunderheads over the Mississippi River waterfront as Banister and Martin wobble out, drunk, down the street.

Rain pours down outside 531 Lafayette Street as Banister opens several locks on the door and turns on the lights. The frosted glass on the door says "W. Guy Banister Associates, Inc., Investigators." It's a typical detective's office with spare desks, simple chairs, large filing cabinets and cubicles in the rear.

Banister, going to a file cabinet to get a bottle out, notices one of the file drawers is slightly ajar. He flies into a rage.

Enraged, Banister pulls a .357 Magnum from his holster, cursing as he suddenly slams it into Martin's temple. The smaller man crumples painfully to the ground.

Jim and his wife, Liz, watch the television. She is in her early 30's, an attractive, quiet southern woman from Louisiana. They live in a spacious two-story wood house, suburban in feel.

TELEVISION IMAGE: Reporters are jammed in the Assembly Room of the Dallas Police Headquarters as Oswald is brought through the corridor, officers on either side of him.

The camera moves onto Jim with Liz and the children - Jasper, the oldest at 4, holds his dad's hand. On Liz's lap, Snapper, the youngest, is asleep. Virginia, the 2-year-old, is pestering the Boxer dog... and Mattie, the heavyset black housekeeper, 35, is in tears.

TELEVISION IMAGE: Oswald in front of the cameras, on a platform.

Oswald seems shocked.

Oswald looks over and spots Ruby in the back of the room, on a table. Recognition is in his eyes. The police start to move him out.

Jim is moved by her.

TELEVISION IMAGE: Texas D.A. Henry Wade addresses the journalists.

Jim moves to the phone as Liz starts the kids up the stairs. The TV cuts to stills of Oswald's life. Two newsmen sit in a studio, smoking, sharing information.

TELEVISION IMAGES: Kennedy's casket coming off the plane in Washington D.C. play under the newsman... Jackie stands there in her blood-spotted dress... we cut to the photograph of L.B.J. taking the oath of office earlier that day... and a still photo of Robert Kennedy's reaction...

Jim is with his key players: Lou Ivon, chief investigator; Susie Cox, in her 30's, and efficient, attractive Assistant D.A.; La Oser, Assistant D.A. in his 40's, serious, spectacled; Bill Broussard, Assistant D.A., handsome, volatile, in his 30's; Numa Bertell, D.A. in his 30's, chubby and friendly, and several others. They sit around a conference table with a black-and-white portable TV on a side table showing the current Sunday, November 24 news from Dallas.

Camera moves to Lou Ivon, looking at paperwork.

Oswald was seen with him several times last summer.

On the TV we see the first image of the "backyard photos" of Lee Harvey Oswald holding the rifle.

The camera moves back to the staff, who watch, obviously influenced.

Members of the team exchange looks of surprise and disbelief.

TELEVISION IMAGE: The basement of the Dallas police headquarters - waiting. Men mill around as Oswald is led out of the basement by two deputies. Jack Ruby rushes forward out of the crowd - and into history - putting his sealing bullet into Oswald. Total chaos erupts...

The camera is on the staff, looking. We hear gasps.

Jim is silent.

We see images of Oswald being lifted onto the stretcher, into the ambulance, and the newscaster crouching, whispering. Everybody in the room is stunned still.

They look to Jim. There's a pause. He is deeply disturbed.

The portable television plays to Jim alone, sitting in his chair smoking a pipe. We see searing images of the funeral - crowds of mourners, the casket being driven through the streets, the honor guards, the horses, the dignitaries walking behind, Jackie veiled... the faces of De Gaulle, MacMillan, Robert Kennedy. We intercut briefly to Lyndon Johnson sitting down earlier that day with the Joint Chiefs of Staff... and then a future cut to Johnson in the Oval Office (staged). The shots are very tight, uncomfortable - noses, eyes, hands - very tight.

As the door opens following a knock, David Ferrie is brought into Jim's office by two police officers and Lou Ivon. Jim stands up, cordial.

Ferrie suffers from alopecia, a disease that has removed all his body hair, and he looks like a Halloween character - penciled eyebrows, one higher than the other, a scruffy reddish wig pasted on askew with glue, thrift store clothing. His eyes, however, are swift and cunning, his smile warm, inviting itself, his demeanor hungry to please.

Ferrie glimpses the low-volumed TV - and images of the funeral. He looks away, jittery, and takes out a cigarette. Sharon brings the coffee in.

Lou and the two cops escort Ferrie out of the office as Jim turns to the television image of Kennedy's final moments of rest. The bugler plays taps. John Jr., 3 years old, in an image which will become famous, salutes his Dad farewell. The riderless horse stands lonely against the Washington sky.

At a small press conference, the FBI spokesman reads a statement.

In Garrison's office see the same broadcast, on the portable television. Lou, Broussard, Numa and Jim watch.

Lou looks at Jim, angry.

He reaches to turn off the TV and get back to work. The last image on the TV is:

Jim flicks the TV off as the overture ends.

We look down at the White House from the plane's point of view. A subtitle reads: "THREE YEARS LATER."

Jim, now 46, reads the front page of THE WASHINGTON POST which details the latest battle in Vietnam. He sits next to Senator Long from Louisiana, in his 50's, who's drinking a whiskey. They're on a crowded businessman's shuttle. We see a close-up of a newspaper article about the Vietnam war: "more troops asked by Westmoreland."

The stewardess brings more drinks.

Russell looks at Jim quizzically and laughs.

The study is lined with bookshelves up to the ceiling; we see photos of family, a chess set. Jim, smoking his pipe, reads in a red leather chair from one of the 26 thick Warren Commission volumes piled all over the place. Liz enters. Jasper, now 7, draws on a piece of paper on the floor at Jim's feet.

Two-year-old Elizabeth watches "Crusader Rabbit" on TV as the new one-year-old sits in diapers with Liz at one end of the dinner table. Jim sits at the other end. There are five kids now, ages 7, 5, 4, 2 and 1... and Mattie, the housekeeper. Dinner's finished, they pass plates, the children horse around... the boxer dog, Touchdown, begs for a piece of the action. Jim, not a big eater, feeds him ice cream.

Virginia and Snapper each get one of Jim's shoes as he dances with them, holding one with each hand.

As the children dance, they fall off Jim's feet, laughing and giggling. He throws each in the air and kisses them.

Liz comes over, smiling. Jim takes her in his arms.

The clock on mantelpiece reads 3 A.M. Jim is alone, smoking his pipe.

In the stillness, his mind crawls all over the place. The camera closes on the thickly-worded pages of the Warren Report.

FLASHBACK TO the Warren Commission hearing room in Dallas, 1964. We hear thin, echoey sound as the attorneys question some of the witnesses.

The overall effect is vague and confusing, as is much of the Warren Report. A Mr. Ball is questioning Lee Bowers, the switchman in the railroad yard. Bowers, in his early 40's, has a trustworthy, working-man face and a crew cut.

Jim, upset, reads on... Another witness, Sgt. D.V. Harkness of the Dallas Police responds to a second attorney.

We see another FLASHBACK - to the Dallas rail yards on the day of the assassination. Three hoboes are being pulled off the freight by the Dallas policemen.

FLASHBACK TO Dealey Plaza an hour or less after the assassination. The three hoboes are marched by shotgun-toting policemen to the Sheriff's office at Dealey Plaza. We note that they do not look much like hoboes.

The camera's point of view is now from the railroad tower near Dealey Plaza. We are fourteen feet off the ground, overlooking the parking lot behind the Grassy Knoll. The shot includes this last car circling in the lot.

Inside the railroad tower, Bowers glances out, busy with the main board, flashing lights, a train coming in.

We see the parking lot from Bower's point of view - at a distance, but we have a sense of the cars and see the men at a distance, tow uniformed men. The parking lot is bumper-to- bumper with a sea of cars. Rain that morning has muddied the lot. These brief images are elaborated on later.

We feel the growing intensity: music, drums - but all blurred. We see a puff of smoke but no sound because of the window Bowers is glancing through. A motorcycle cop shoots up the Grassy Knoll incline. People run, blurring into a larger mosaic of confusion. Bowers is confused, seeing this.

INTERCUT with Jim's heart pounding as he reads.

Back in Dealey Plaza, S.M. Holland, an elderly signal supervisor, stands on the parapet of the railway.

We see the scene from Holland's point of view - the puff of smoke lingering under the trees along the picket fence after the shooting.

Jim is asleep, having a tortured dream.

DREAMSCAPE FLASHBACK: We see the Zapruder film, in slow-motion and J.F.K.'s face just before he goes behind Stemmons Freeway sign. Jim sits up suddenly.

Liz stirs, shaken.

She takes him now, gently, and pulls him down on top of her and kisses him.

A Sunday, early. We see a statue of Ben Franklin in an empty square frequented by drunks who doze on benches in a little leafy park in the center of the Square. The camera moves to Jim by himself and then moves to a sedan, pulling up, which disgorges Lou Ivon and Bill Broussard.

TIME CUT TO Jim indicating 531 Lafayette Street, a seedy, faded, three-story building across the street from the square.

FLASHBACK TO the exterior of the Banister Office on a day in 1963. The door is now clearly labelled "W. GUY BANISTER, INC. INVESTIGATORS." It opens and Banister comes out in slow motion, neatly dressed, rose in his lapel - the same office and same man we saw three years before when he pistol- whipped Jack Martin. Banister seems to be smiling right at us, greeting us.

Back to the Lafayette Square of 1966. Jim walks Ivon and Bill to the corner, to another entrance to the same building - this one with a sign that says "544 Camp Street."

Bill studies the present sign: "Crescent City Dental Laboratory", and gives Jim a puzzled look.

Lou gets it and glances up. We FLASHBACK TO the exterior of 544 Camp Street in 1963. Lee Oswald comes out the door into a full close-up, now clearly seen by us, and heads out into the street as Guy Banister intercepts him on the sidewalk, holding a leaflet and point to "544 Camp Street stamped on it. Guy seems miffed at Oswald, tells him something quickly, and then moves on.

FLASHBACK to Canal Street in New Orleans on a summer day in 1963. Oswald, in a thin tie and white short-sleeved shirt, and wearing a homemade placard reading "Hands Off Cuba"; "Viva Fidel!", is hawking leaflets to pedestrians with two young helpers.

A large white-haired businessman in a white suit, very distinguished, walks with a friend on Canal Street. Oswald glances at him and meets his eyes. The businessman enters an office building. This man is Clay Bertrand, later known as Clay Shaw.

Some Cubans, led by Carols Bringuier, now appear. One of them, "the Bull", is heavy-set with dark glasses. More of him will also be seen.

Carlos throws Oswald's leaflets in the air and pulls off his glasses, prepared to fight. Oswald only smiles, and puts his arms down in an X of passivity.

There is no real fight, but the police, as if pre-alerted, arrive.

Arrests are made. We see Oswald in a room in the police station, talking with FBI Agent John Quigley. A calendar on the wall shows that it's August, 1963.

In a television studio in 1963, Oswald debates Carlos Bringuier with two moderators.

Back in 1966, Jim walks with his two assistants.

We see the Post Office building across the street.

Jim makes a gesture encompassing the whole Square.

A straggly group of people watch from the grandstands eating hotdogs and talking in small clusters. The horses are running early morning laps. Three men sit apart in the bleachers. A scared Jack Martin, three years older than when last seen, still wearing the Dick Tracy hat, sucks up coffee like a worm does moisture. He has the red puffy cheeks of an alcoholic and deeply circled, worried eyes. Bill and Jim wait.

What I need is a little clarification about the night Guy Banister beat you over the head with his Magnum. You called our office hopping mad from your hospital bed. Don't tell me you don't remember that?

Jack looks away and doesn't respond.

SUDDEN FLASHBACK to the night of the pistol-whipping. The camera shows Banister laying Martin's head open / the beating the humiliation.

Bill looks at Jim.

FLASHBACK to Banister's office in 1963. There are Cubans in battle fatigues and combat boots; duffle bags are lying around. David Ferrie, in fatigues, directs the Cubans as they carry crates of ammunition and weapons into a back room. Martin observes from another desk.

Still in 1963, we see the exterior of Banister's office. A dozen Cubans follow Ferrie downstairs into the street, and pile into several cars, duffels thrown in with them. Ferrie drives the lead car.

We see the cars cross the long Lake Pontchartrain Bridge and enter a remote guerrilla training camp. Bayou and jungle are all around.

At the guerrilla training camp at Lake Pontchartrain in 1963, we see scenes of basic training - shooting, obstacle courses, callisthenics - led by Ferrie and other trainers. Scattered among the Cubans are several white American mercenaries. We catch a glimpse of Oswald and glimpses of several other men we will see again, in sprinklings.

It's night at the training camp. FBI agents race up in cars in the middle of the night, swarming over the camp, rounding up the trainees.

We see FBI agents loading dynamite, bomb casings, arms 155mm artillery shells, etc.

Back at the racetrack in 1966, Jim listens.

Martin hesitates. We hear the rhythmic beating of the horse hooves and Martin sucking on the steaming cup of coffee.

FLASHBACK TO Banister's office in 1963. Banister and Martin shooting the breeze as the straight-laced middle-aged secretary, Delphine Roberts, hurries in.

Banister just looks at her and laughs.

Back at the racetrack...

FLASHBACK to Banisters office on a day in 1963. Martin is snooping in Banister's files. Cut to Martin leaving the office as a big businessman with white hair briefly talks to Oswald and then goes into Banister's private office.

Banister lets the man into his private office.

Martin picks his way nervously down the bleacher benches.

Jim drives, with Numa in the front and Bill in the back.

Jim pulls the car over to park.

Jim and the others get out of the car and head towards Antoine's Restaurant. A black woman greets him.

She laughs. Others move in on him.

They enter a busy lunchtime crowd in an elegant eatery. Lou Ivon and Al Oser are waiting for them as they're shown to their table by the Maitre d'.

Lou's been waiting, excited. He gives Jim blowups of the five hobo photographs.

The camera moves in on the photographs.

FLASHBACK TO the "hoboes" being escorted to the Sheriff's office - as per Sgt. Harkness' earlier description.

Susie Cox arrives.

How 'bout that railroad man, Lee Bowers? Saw those men at the picket fence?

She talked to a cop from a hospital bed two days before the assassination, said Kennedy would be hit that Friday. She said she was a dope runner for Jack Ruby and that Ruby knew Oswald for years...

FLASHBACK to Rose lying dead on an empty highway.

Jack Ruby's been rotting in a Dallas jail cell for three years. Maybe he's ready to crack?

FLASHBACK TO Moscow in 1959. We see shots of the city - strange and eerie black-and-white stills. Inside the U.S. Embassy Oswald slaps his passport on the table with a formal letter. Two consuls attend him.

Continuing the Moscow flashback, we see Oswald talking with a female journalist in his small room in the Hotel Metropole. Again he sounds robotic.

We see photos of the city of Minks, in Russia, Oswald with various friends and tourists, shots of Lee and Marina with a new baby.

We see documentary shots of the U2 on Russian soil... Francis Gary Powers... The Summit Conference canceled... Eisenhower and Khrushchev.

The screen shows photos of New York: Empty docks... a ship coming in... Wall Street on a Sunday morning - Graphic Weegee- type black-and-white stills, then a photo of Spas T. Raikin.

FLASHBACK TO a Forth Worth map factory. We see Oswald at work on photo mattes with a Minox spy camera. The camera shows close-ups of maps and then flashes to a hand in the photographic section. We see a close-up of Oswald's head in a photograph - the same headshot that will be superimposed on the Oswald photo - and a razor blade cutting mattes.

FLASHBACK TO Fort Worth in 1963. In Oswald's cheap apartment, seven White Russians, including George de Mohrenschildt, a distinguished grey-haired man in his late fifties, are visiting Marina and Oswald, bringing old dresses, groceries, and toys and milk for the crying baby, whose cradle is two suitcases.

We see Oswald and de Mohrenschildt talking with the others and a magazine cover with J.F.K. the subject of discussion.

TIME CUT TO Oswald's apartment on a different day in 1963. George de Mohrenschildt points out a Mannlicher-Carcano rifle in the closet, turns to Lee.

Lee's look is sickly. He freezes up.

RESUME scene of White Russian gathering in Oswald's apartment.

Anna Meller, one of the guests, glances at a copy of Das Kapital in a pile of books, and talks to another Russian man about it... Talking now to Lee and Marina are Janet and Bill Williams, a mid-American couple in their late twenties, freshly minted.

We see Oswald and another man in the Texas School Book Depository in 1963. They are hauling and stacking school textbooks - an obviously lower-level job for Oswald after the map factory. We cut ahead to empty graphics of the sealed off area, the window site, the cafeteria.

We see the interior of the Williams' home in Irving on a day in 1963.

We see Marina and Oswald in bed at night in the Williams' house, in a tender scene. Oswald says goodbye to his child.

TIME CUT TO Oswald living in a boarding house. It is at night, and he sits in his room alone. The housekeeper, Earlene Roberts, heavyset, white, in her 60's, comes in and asks him if he wants to watch some TV with her. He declines.

FLASHBACK TO Marina on TV, a different person from before.

BACK TO Antoine's Restaurant.

We see blank faces around the table.

Jack Ruby, thick fudge of an angry face, flu-ridden, confronts a doctor and two guards in his cell.

Ruby looks over at the two guards, who eye him. The Doctor gives him the injection.

FLASHBACK TO Ruby's jail cell in 1964. Ruby talks to men with their backs to us. Lawyers and police clutter the cell, making Ruby hyper-nervous. The chief official's white hair and avuncular voice are all we see and hear of him; his back is to us.

Ruby catches the stern face of Sheriff Bill Decker from the corner of his eye, the Assistant D.A. next to him.

The camera pauses on Ruby's face. The men rise and leave in the shadows.

Jack Ruby is escorted out of the infirmary, dead of cancer.

The puffy, smiling face of Dean Andrews, framed by huge black glasses, talks in a Louisiana hippie argot of the 50's. The restaurant has a fancy French decor, mirrored walls, marble - it serves the cream of Louisiana society.

Sudden FLASHBACK to Andrews' office on a day in 1963. Clay Bertrand sits, back to us, talking to Andrews. He has close- cropped white hair. He is the same patrician man we've seen earlier with Oswald on Canal Street and in Banister's office. Andrews is evidently lying.

Jim, in present, looking briefly - a pretty girl walking in.

FLASHBACK TO Andrews' office on another day in 1963. We catch a glimpse of a young swish sitting in Andrew's office talking on the phone. Andrews is also on the phone to Bertrand, unseen, on the other end.

FLASHBACK TO a third day at Andrew's office in 1963. Oswald is in the office with two young boys.

As Andrews resumes eating his crabmeat Louie with gusto, Jim reaches over and grabs the fork in mid-air.

Andrews puts down the fork, shaken, silent for a moment.

At a nearby table, a waiter has just poured brandy on Crepe Suzettes. A blue flame hovers in the air as Jim leans forward across the table, speaking deliberately.

Andrews stands suddenly.

Andrews drops his pink napkin in the crabmeat and waddles out. Jim now feels closer to the truth than ever.

From the point of view of an approaching car, the prison looms over the swamp, dogs patrolling the wire.

A chief guard walks Jim and Bill into a circus-like atmosphere. In Louisiana the prisoners can wear any outfit they choose, which makes this prison look like Mardi Gras. There are many transvestites.

Willie O'Keefe, a handsome, muscled, young chickenhawk with an earring, bandana, colorful clothes, an aura of burned truth in his intense, staring brown eyes and thick country accent, sashays over.

TIMECUT TO the prison work area, where Willie talks, leaning against a tree looking out on a mangrove swamp. It's lunch break and other prisoners move in the background, eating, socializing.

FLASHBACK TO the Masquerade Bar in the French Quarter. It's nighttime and Ferrie, Bertrand and O'Keefe sit at a back booth. Bertrand, as seen earlier, is an imposing, white- haired patrician man, over six feet tall, heavily defined bones and eyelids, in his late 40's or early 50's.

They rise to leave. Bertrand with a slight limp.

FLASHBACK TO Dave Ferrie's apartment on a night in 1963. The place is filled messy bricabrac, including two dozen mouse cages for Ferrie's cancer experiments. Ferrie, Bertrand, O'Keefe, and four Cubans in battle fatigues are laughing and fooling around. Oswald is in a corner cleaning a .22 rifle with a scope on it. He looks different, unkempt, unshaven. A record player grinds out a speech in Spanish by Castro. Some other people are there as well - it's a beatnik scene: sandals, hanging out, only one woman. Ferrie is taking pictures throughout of the group horsing around, photographing Oswald.

Ferrie separates them. Oswald seems to resent an outsider being there.

TIMECUT TO later that night, when only O'Keefe, Ferrie, Bertrand, Oswald and three Cubans are left.

Oswald looks up, listens quietly.

Bertrand with his arms around O'Keefe, laughs, tries to change the subject.

Oswald listens, playing with his rifle. Bertrand suddenly turns cold, flashing a look at Ferrie.

BACK TO the prison work area. Jim and O'Keefe continue talking.

As he talks, Jim shares a sickened look with Bill. Whatever truth he may be telling is necessarily compromised by an attitude that could be destroyed in court.

Jim, Lou, Al, Susie, and Numa sit around the table having an after hours conference. The kids run in and out of the room, playing. Susie is doing the talking, showing new paperwork and photos.

FLASHBACK TO the Lincoln-Mercury dealership. Oswald is deliberately kept in half or three quarter shots - a mystery figure. He kicks the tires on a used red Mercury Comet, cocky.

"OSWALD"

Let's take it out for a test drive.

The salesman, Bogard, is hesitant. "Oswald" doesn't look like he's got a dime to his name.

"OSWALD"

(SENSING BOGARD'S HESITANCY) Hey, I got a lotta money coming in the next two weeks.

In the next scene we see the car, driven by "Oswald", zooming up the ramp and disappearing onto the freeway.

Resume the scene at the dealership.

"Oswald", unhappy, starts to leave.

"OSWALD" Who you kidding! For this heap? Forget it... No honest working man can afford a car anymore in the goddamn country! Maybe I'll have to go back to Russia to buy a car...

FLASHBACK TO a Dallas firing range in 1963.

"OSWALD" Hey, sorry, buddy. I just thought it was that sonofabitch Kennedy, y'know. I couldn't help myself. (laughs)

FLASHBACK TO the corridor of Silvia Odio's apartment in Dallas on a night in 1963. Oswald drags behind two Cubans - one is "the Bull", heavyset with a scar over his left eye, who we saw at the Canal Street incident, and the other, "the Indian", is quiet and cold. The men ring the doorbell and talk to a concerned Silvia as Oswald hangs back, watching, in the shadows. The men give her intimate information about her father, who is imprisoned in Cuba. The men chatter ad lib in Spanish.

We see a shot of Silvia on the phone in her apartment intercut with a shot of "the Bull" in a gas station phone booth, on a night in 1963.

Silvia Odio is surprised to hear this information volunteered. "The Bull's" eyes are on "Oswaldo", outside the booth with "the Indian". They're hanging out, talking to a mystery man, an Anglo.

Jim looks at the famous photo... the camera closes in on a heavyset man who looks nothing like Oswald. Liz has come back in and overhears.

Susie picks up the famous Life magazine cover shot of Oswald holding a rifle in his backyard.

FLASHBACK TO the Dallas Homicide Office in 1963. Oswald is being interrogated by Will Fritz, Dallas Homicide Chief, who shows him the original of the photo from the Williams garage.

We see a blowup of the photo - the shadows, the crop mark.

Broussard walks past a jazz wake leaving the cemetery - black flambeurs carry torches, people sing "When the Saints Go Marching in". Bill is with a local gambler type.

(PAUSE) Let's call it a night. (to Lou) Anything new on Ruby?

The staff members, anxious to go home, have all risen... and now sigh.

They all raise their hands as Bill walks in, excited.

They all stop, look.

Liz Garrison is the most shaken, as she pours a fresh pot of coffee.

Liz walks out of the room silent. There is a tense pause.

The TV is on to the latest Vietnam Reports - combat footage.

Liz plays with the kids looking for Easter eggs. The dog is barking - it's a scene of commotion. Jim is getting ready to go out.

As he leaves, the camera holds on Liz.

Clay Shaw ("Bertrand"), in an elegant white summer suit, is shown in. Indeed, there is a slight limp to his gait which Jim notices right away.

He shares a look with Bill. Susie is also in the room. Shaw's rich bassoon voice drips with dialect. Imperiously smoking a Gaulois, Shaw has about him an air of authority matched only by Jim's.

FLASHBACK TO Clay's Dauphine Street residence, in the Quarter, at night in 1962. The butler opens the door and O'Keefe is admitted to the townhouse. Shaw appears behind the butler.

At Shaw's house, dinner is served at a long table by the black butler. The table is decorated by a sumptuous setting of silver and candelabra.

Shaw uses a bell to summon the butler.

Willie O'Keefe and Clay Shaw leave the dining table.

At Shaw's townhouse, we see Ferrie coming in, with another young chicken.

We see the four men in drag, smiling for the flash camera, champagne bottles in hand. Ferrie sniffs some poppers, then shoves a popper in Shaw's face.

Ferrie forces more poppers on Shaw. The camera movies to Shaw's bedroom, where Ferrie scatters a drawer full of leather tools.

BACK TO Garrison's office.

Jim is getting incredibly irritated. He feels Shaw is lying.

CUT TO Antoine's Restaurant, where Liz and all five kids look at menus.

BACK TO Garrison's office later that day. Everyone looks tired as the questioning goes on. Shaw sucks on endless Gauloises.

Jim shows Shaw a newspaper clipping.

Shaw glares at him. Silence.

Susie and Bill quiet Jim down.

Jim walks in, contrite. Liz is shutting down the house. Some of the kids are still up.

Jim, is coming down the corridor with Broussard, is confronted by some 20 local journalists and TV crew members. We hear a hubbub of fierce questioning - ad libs but Jim, puzzled, brushes by, seeking refuge in his office. Lou, Al, Numa and Susie are all waiting for him. The regular staff - some 30 people - are looking, wondering. Lou presents him with the front page of the New Orleans States-Item.

We see a close-up of the headline: "D.A. LAUNCHES FULL J.F.K. DEATH PLOT PROBE - Mysterious Trips Cost Large Sums."

Jim, at his desk, finishes reading the article. A huge picture of him is on the front page. He puts down the paper, reaching for a long, gold pen that is part of the desk set.

They look at each other.

No takers.

Everyone waits. Jim stands, repacks his briefcase with papers and reference books and heads for the back door elevator.

Lou drinks a beer in front of the TV news in his small bachelor apartment. A fan is blowing.

The phone rings and Ivon picks it up.

We see Ferrie in a phone booth on the street outside his apartment house in the French Quarter. He's a nervous wreck, watching the reporters and TV cameras surrounding his place, waiting for him.

Ferrie hangs up. Pause. At his end, Lou Ivon hangs up, excited.

The phone rings. Liz picks it up. Jim is watching the TV news: Martin Luther King is delivering a speech against the Vietnam War.

The phone rings again.

Jim and Lou watch as Ferrie paces wildly, speeding.

As Lou picks up the phone and orders room service, Jim answers.

Lou writes it down. Seeing him writing makes Ferrie even more paranoid.

He feels Lou for bugs, but out of a sense of hierarchy, ignores Jim. He checks around the room - the phone, behind paintings, flower vase, light fixtures - as the batty conversation continues:

Room service knocks, and Ferrie jumps and rushes to the bathroom.

Jim whispers something and Lou goes to the door, takes the service table without letting the bellhop in. Jim, excited but trying to stay even, continues with Ferrie.

FLASHBACK TO Ferrie at the party with Oswald (obscured) per Willie O'Keefe's witness. Jim, in the present, doesn't feel right about it.

He bows his head, holding it in his hands, and his wig starts to come off in his hands.

There's a long silence. Ferrie, spent, stares at Jim. He's about to crack, but...

His eyes are going again. Deals... intrigue - thru the tears.

Lou and Jim share a look.

A mob scene. Press from the U.S. and all over the world are filling the corridor. A French reporter tries to get past the receptionist as Numa passes him with a stack of mail. Also in the hall are many individual citizens who have come to give tips and theories. One of them is dressed as Satan in a red jump suit with mask, horns, tail and a pitchfork.

A mailman, black, comes through lugging three sacks of mail.

A camera moves by into the interior offices.

Bill escorts him out before he gets the chance to sit down, and then heads for Jim's office.

Jim is reading Newsweek, deeply hurt. There are newspapers all over his desk.

Bill has come in during this, completely frazzled.

Numa pulls a dollar bill from the envelope.

Jim is moved. Bill is not.

Sharon has come in during this, signalling to Jim.

Sharon shows in Mr. Miller, the Denver oilman. He's a self- assured, impressive man in his 50's with a western accent, cowboy boots and hat, and a well-cut gabardine suit.

Numa leaves. Bill indicates he'd like to sit in. Jim nods okay. Miller pays no attention to Bill.

Jim has gathered together a group of photos of the shooting. Sharon bringing the coffee.

He glances at the photo but continues on across the room, looking at the pictures on the walls.

We see a blurry blowup of something behind the picket fence. Miller takes the photo, glances at it and sits down.

Jim expectant of some help. A pause. Then:

The clock is ticking. Jim shares a look with Bill. The cards are on the table.

Miller smiles, stands, paces the room. He continues to ignore Bill completely.

He leans forward across Jim's desk, tapping his manicured index finger on the desk. Clearly visible to Jim and to us (in a close-up) is Miller's Annapolis ring tapping.

Jim's eyes go to Bill. He could be wrong, but it's almost as if Bill were going along with the idea now.

Jim leans back, puts his feet up on the corner of the desk, waving them like fans. Bill waits.

Miller waits. Bill waits. Jim comes forward with his reply.

Miller's entire demeanor tightens into a corkscrew of anger and danger.

Bill has a strange reaction - a sudden exhalation of breath as if an entire house of cards were collapsing. He rises, but Miller goes first, leaving silently. Once he's gone, Bill turns wearily to Jim.

The staff is assembled. We see the headline in the Times- Picayune, which says: "FERRIE CALLS GARRISON PROBE A WITCH HUNT."

Numa rushes in with a young investigator, Williams - displaying a miniature microphone.

Numa makes violent signals to shut up - not to talk - sticking the microphone in front of Jim. Williams searches the walls for the bug. Numa signals everyone outside.

The whole staff from the conference room reacts. Jim looks stunned.

Sharon has been standing there trying to get Lou's attention.

Lou goes to the phone.

Everyone laughs, but the camera goes to the look of shock on Lou's face as he holds the receiver. They all look over at him; feeling the bad news before they hear it.

Jim's look says "There goes the case."

Jim and his staff storm into the area, which is cordoned off by police.

Members of the press are all over, yelling questions at Jim.

The apartment is filthy and sinister. Hundreds of mice squeal in their cages, upset by the invasion of men and light. Nothing seems to have been washed in years. There is an accumulation of furniture, college pennants, photos of young boys in training, books everywhere, ammunition, guns, a piano, maps, fake college degrees on the walls. Ferrie's naked body lies on the couch with a sheet over it. He is unwigged, his eyebrows unpainted, false teeth next to him. Jim studies the corpse as the coroner comes alongside.

Jim picks several empty, capless medicine bottles on a table next to the sofa and looks at them. Lou and Bill come over with a typed suicide note.

The words from the note hang there weirdly, as Jim paces on into the apartment, one of them medicine bottles in his hand. The music grows, and a sinister feel of danger and death pervades the atmosphere. Then the sounds drop away.

Jim runs an eye through Dave's closet, cluttered with shabby jackets.

His eye falls on a neat but faded lace and satin, some sort of garment of priestly origin, he takes it in his hand.

Susie Cox walks in, a new message written on her face.

Jim's mood darkens, and he heads back into the living room as Ferrie's corpse is being trundled out the door. The sickness is everywhere; an oppressive mood. Bill comes up.

Jim, feeling ill, wanting to leave, stops the coroner before he exits...

As Jim, questioned by reporters, gets in his car and leaves, Bill waves goodbye to Lou and walks toward his own car, dejected. The area is cordoned off and humming with activity. Frank, an FBI man who knows Bill from previous cases, approaches him out of the crowd. He wears a hat, suit, and tie.

This gets Bill's attention.

Bill, taken aback, listens.

Jim walks down from the Lincoln Memorial, where he is met unobtrusively by a military man in his 50's in casual clothing, hat on his head, an erect posture. They walk towards the Mall, with the Capitol building looming in the background.

The man doesn't answer. Jim, after his meeting with Miller and loss of Ferrie, is testy and suspicious.

Something about his manner speaks of authority, knowledge, and above all, old-fashioned honesty - the eyes looking at you straight on. He indicates a bench.

FLASHBACK TO the Pentagon offices in 1963. X strides down a busy hall and into the offices of one of his superiors, Major General Y, a lean, cold warrior, battlefield handsome, civilian clothes, and several advisors. There's a U.S. flag on the wall. The status of Y is only clear by the sing on the desk, the name blocked by a passing figure.

We hear vague ad-lib mutterings on the soundtrack indicating a friendly atmosphere, and we see stock footage of a C-130 transport flying to Antarctica and ice floes on the surface of the sea.

Then, at a New Zealand airport, we see X, in a uniform, at a newsstand reading of Kennedy's assassination. The banner headline of an "Extra" edition of The Christchurch Star screams out "KENNEDY SHOT DEAD."

Back at the Pentagon office, we see X returning and meeting Y. The atmosphere is cordial, but Y is slightly different from before - more harried, more nervous. He turns away to light a cigarette, he doesn't want the usual conversation.

We see an outdoor shot of the Texas Army Headquarters on a day in 1963. Inside, on the same day, Col. Reich is on the phone, puzzled.

In Dealey Plaza, 1963, we see an Army intelligence man taking a shot with a Minolta camera.

The camera is on Jim, listening. This information is much greater than he ever envisioned, and he is stunned. X pauses.

FLASHBACK TO the Pentagon offices on a day in 1961. A document is moved by hand into Lemnitzer's office where we see a set of hands holding it while it's read. There's a look of surprise on Lemnitzer's face.

DOCUMENTARY IMAGES flash on the screen - Allen Dulles, sweet- faced, smiling, at the Warren Commission Hearing and visiting Dealey Plaza; General Charles Cabell and Richard Bissell...

At Arlington Cemetery on the same day, Jim visits the grave of President Kennedy. We see the eternal flame. Jim thinks about what he should do now. The size of it stuns him. He is lost, reeling back to the past in his mind.

DISSOLVE TO DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of Dachau concentration camp: thousands of bodies are piled and bulldozed... And then back to Jim at Arlington Cemetery reliving it... only the enormity of past evil can prepare him to confront present evil. In a strange way, it reassures him.

FLASHBACK TO the White House, 1963. Lyndon Johnson is with Henry Cabot Lodge. We see them as shadowy figures from a distance across the wide room, or near a veranda with a porch and plenty of light. Johnson, his back to us, talks in a loud, thick Texas drawl (mostly muted) and signs a document.

In the park with X, Jim is staggered by all this information. X ceases walking and looks at Jim.

Jim watches this mystery man walking away. The figure vanishes in the Washington breeze. Flags flap over some distant memorial to some distant history of the Republic. Jim rises, a decision made.

Jim, Lou, Al, Numa and several policemen stand at the door as Clay Shaw comes to it.

The voice dropping away as the devastated look on Shaw's face spreads, sickly, undone, his arrogant public composure gone, face now filled with terror, disbelief.

The policemen take Shaw while the D.A. staff moves into the carriage house past the butler, Frankie Jenkins.

Shaw is being fingerprinted. He seems rattled. Police officers try to get the press under control.

Habighorst notes it as routinely as Shaw seems to have said it, without thinking, possibly preoccupied by thoughts of press people pushing in.

We see a shot of the exterior of the Justice Department in 1967.

The acting Attorney General speaks to the press.

Jim confronts a packed room. Bill is with him.

We see a shot of the Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C. and then a corridor inside the building. A Chief Justice, looking gray and wise like Earl Warren, moves along the corridor in his black robe delivering his verdict to the press.

In his own office, Jim responds to Justice Warren.

It doesn't play with the press. They shuffle off, quiet, whispering.

Liz and Jim watch, silently devastated, as the NBC "WHITE PAPER" unfolds, attacking Jim. They can do nothing. Liz leaves the room, upset.

Julia Ann Mercer, 28, looks at Jim with sincere eyes. Her husband, a prosperous Republican businessman, watches from the corner. Jim - along with Al - has her testimony in front of him.

FLASHBACK TO Dealey Plaza in 1963. It's a normal scene - cars, traffic, people starting to arrive for Kennedy's appearance. We catch a glimpse of Julia Ann Mercer, 23, driving, then stopping traffic.

She glances over at the man in the driver's seat. It's Jack Ruby, wearing a green jacket. Then she sees a young white man in his mid - 20's, in a gray jacket, brown pants, plaid shirt and wool stocking hat, getting out of the passenger side, going to the rear of the van, opening a tool compartment and removing a package that looks like a rifle wrapped in paper. He walks up the embankment in the direction of the picket fence. Ruby looks over and stares at Julia Ann, who turns away and notices three police officers standing near a motorcycle on the overpass bridge. Her eyes lock with Ruby's a second time and as the traffic moves, she drives on.

In the Dallas FBI office, Mercer sits at a table looking at photos. Two FBI agents stand near her showing her photos. She shakes her head "no" several times, until they put a shot of Jack Ruby in front of her. She holds it up.

Back in the present, Jim continues to question Mercer.

Jim is silent. Mercer picks up the report and finds the pertinent paragraphs:

BEVERLY, a woman of ample proportions and a big, cute Texas face, ex-club singer, meets with Jim and Lou Ivon in a nightclub not unlike Ruby's Carousel.

Jada and Beverly sit down at the table with Ferrie, Oswald, and Jack, with Jack doing the buying. It's too loud to hear anything.

THE CAMERA MOVES IN ON JADA

BACK TO the 1967 scene.

Our view is from the roof of the building on the extreme south side of the Plaza. J.C. Price, the building engineer, in hat and overalls, points for Jim and Lou.

The camera tightens on the picket fence.

On the overpass near Dealey Plaza, S.M. Holland, a tan, elderly, leather-faced signal supervisor, points to the picket fence for Jim and Lou. His accent is thick and rural. We saw him before, briefly, when Jim was reading the Warren Report.

FLASHBACK TO the restaged shooting. The smoke hangs under the trees.

CUT TO Richard Dodd on the overpass. He's a cowboy type with a hat and an even thicker accent than Holland.

FLASHBACK to the motorcycle...

BACK TO 1967. Jim and Lou walk with Dodd and Holland near the picket fence. We feel the emptiness of the area now and see the normal amount of traffic driving by.

The camera shows the "spot" and Lou sighting.

Jim looks, reliving the moment.

Later Jim and Lou stand on the south side of Elm Street in Dealey Plaza talking to Jean Hill, an attractive, 30-ish teacher. Her demeanor has a rock-solid Texas back-country conviction to it; she's a woman not easily frightened.

We see a flash of the Moorman photograph - a blurry Polaroid with the President in the foreground and the picket fence in background. We will return to this photograph in more detail later.

FLASHBACK TO the day of the shooting. We hear the sound of shots and see the Grassy Knoll from Jean's point of view.

Blurry image - we're not at all sure what or who or if... but a seed is planted. We see smoke - the same smoke Bowers saw... then Jack Ruby in a brown coat running from the Book Depository toward the railroad tracks. Then we see Jean's view as she runs toward the Knoll along with others. there are yells, shouts, and general confusion.

At the picket fence, we see blurry images of police officers, railroad workers, cigarette butts, buddy footprints, confusion...

*JEAN HILL I never did catch him. All I saw in that parking area were railroad workers and Dallas' finest.

Two Secret Service types approach her suddenly, and one of them puts an arm on her shoulder.

The two agents hustle her away.

Hill, 32 years old that day, is shown into a third floor office of the County Courts Building - which has a view of the assassination area. Other Secret Service agents are there. Some 18 people are detained there.

TIME CUT TO two men interrogating Hill.

In a Parkland Hospital office in 1964, a lawyer interviews Jean Hill. A female stenographer takes notes.

Back at the Knoll.

DISSOLVE TO a scene inside the Texas School Book Depository in 1967. Jim and Lou walk the floor and look out the windows. Lou has a Mannlicher-Carcano in his hand with a sight and clip. We see Oswald's supposed view of the limousine as he pulls the trigger. Now, innocuous traffic goes by, but the iris of the camera tightens into a sniper's scope.

Lou cocks the Mannlicher for the first shot. Jim looks at this watch.

Lou assumes the Oswald pose, crouched at the window aiming out.

Lou pulls, quickly recharges the bolt, fires, recycles, fires.

Jim points the Carcano south, right up Houston Street, following a car that happens to be passing by - a convertible with an unknown woman driving.

The camera swings to the Grassy Knoll and the picket fence as seen from the sixth floor of the Depository.

The camera swings to the Daltex Building across the street.

Jim pulls the dead trigger, reliving the moment through the scope on a passing car.

Jim swings the scope up to confront Main Street. Another car is in his sight. Too far.

Moving at a normal 25 mph, they knew the motorcade would have to slow to about 10 miles per hour to make this turn. That's where you get him.

The camera swings to the Houston and Main intersection.

Lou walks to another window in the empty Book Depository where Oswald supposedly did his dirty deed and looks out over the plaza, with all its ghosts. Jim and Lou are two men - with only two men's power. A terrible aloneness pervades their minds.

FLASHBACK TO 1963 - the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository - the same place Jim and Lou are now. Jim looks around and sees one shooter and one spotter with a lunchbox radio, in repairman clothes. Jim is watching. Neither of these men is Oswald. We hear the sounds of the motorcade below. The shooter pulls the trigger on the Carcano. A loud frightening sound snaps Jim back to the present.

We see another smoke-filled conference of assistants. Paperwork is stacked in the corners almost to the ceiling; there are coffee cups and doughnuts on desks. The disorganization and lack of resources are apparent. The staff working on this project now numbers some eleven people, and there are some new investigators and assistants. We sense that the trial is drawing closer.

Numa is opening another stack of letters. The dollar bills keep coming. He points to two giant stacks of mail.

FLASHBACK TO Dallas FBI Office in 1963. Oswald is at the counter addressing the female receptionist.

TIMECUT TO FBI James Hosty confronting his agitated superior, FBI Agent Shanklin in one of his cubicles.

FLASHBACK TO Oswald, under arrest, meeting with Quigley.

Holds up the telex. We see a close-up: "URGENT TO ALL SACS FROM DIRECTOR."

FLASHBACK TO New Orleans FBI office in 1963. Walter, the night clerk, receives the teletype, reads it, and runs it.

FLASHBACK TO a Dallas safe house in 1963. Oswald, Ruby, and several Cubans including the Bull and the Indian are talking.

Underneath the voice-over we hear and see Oswald, with a floor plan of the Book Depository, at the center of the group. Jack Ruby, Bull, and the Indian, two or three young Cubans and a young white shooter - the man in the plaid shirt described by Julia Ann Mercer - are also there.

Ruby shares a look with Bull unbeknownst to Oswald, and then we see the looks on the faces of Jim's team.

Back in Garrison's office in 1968.

His voice is challenging. There's a pause. The men exchange looks and wait.

The others in the room groan at the reasoning. Bill feels embittered, cornered.

Tension, silence.

He storms out.

It's after dinner and toys scattered around the living room. Snapper is chasing his sister Elizabeth around. Virginia, 6, runs to the ringing phone in the living room, as her mother and Mattie, stunned, watch the news of Martin Luther King's death on TV.

CUT TO Jim's study, where Jim also watches the news in horror. We see TV images of Martin Luther King on the motel balcony, dead.

Jim, visibly shaken, slams his book down on the desk in frustration.

BACK TO the male voice on the phone.

Liz comes to the phone, a wary look on her face.

After a pause, the man hangs up.

Liz freaks out. She marches into Jim's study.

Her height, her weight, when she came home from school.

The kids, hearing the shouting, come to watch from the door of the study.

Jim controls himself, shoos the kids out, closes the door.

The children press in at the door. Mattie, ignoring them, is enraged as she watches King's eulogy on TV. Riots are already breaking out.

She runs out, past the stunned kids, sobbing as she goes up the stairs. Jim pursues her like an angry spirit, yelling up the stairs at her.

The kids move away, fearful. Quaking with rage and hurt, Jim stands there at the bottom of the stairs, strangled with pain. He takes a law dictionary in his hand and throws it across the room. Jasper and Virginia come over to him.

The band strikes up "When the Saints Go Marching In" introducing Jim, who strides in from the wings to shake hands with Jerry Johnson, the friendly-looking host.

The audience is enthusiastic. Jim smiles and waves, then sits down next to Johnson.

He reads from a script on the desk.

He fixes his eyes on Jim, waiting for a reply. A weariness has set in on Jim. Once more into the slaughter.

The audience, loving it, cheers. Johnson looks at Jim blankly, and reads the next question on his list.

He pulls out a large blowup of the Allen photo of the three hoboes and starts to hold it up in front of the camera.

It takes Johnson a few moments to realize what's happening. When he does, he lunges like a cobra for the photographs, pulling Jim's arm down so the pictures are out of the camera's view.

Jim swings the picture up a third time, but the stage director gives a "cut" signal - finger across the throat - and the red light on the camera blinks off. The monitor shows another camera panning the audience.

The director frantically gives Johnson the "cut" sign.

The audience cheers as the commercial comes on.

Jim comes home. His wife and two of the children are waiting in the doorway. They kiss. Al Oser interrupts.

On the TV, the news is on.

We see a shot of Robert Kennedy in Los Angeles with his supporters.

Liz shares a look with Al and Numa.

We don't have a choice.

She walks out.

We see the outside of Jim's house and hear crickets chirping - the purr of the suburb. Inside, the TV election results are still on.

Jim is in the kitchen fixing himself a sandwich. There's a strange feeling in the house. We hear the wind - a shutter sighing. Jim suddenly doesn't feel alone in the kitchen.

He waves and leaves the podium, going back through the kitchen of the hotel. Jim is frozen in his spot, shaken. The ghost of Jack Kennedy - as he was before the killing - stares at him through the kitchen, as if encased in a hologram. The hooded eyes watch Jim without expression. They're communicating, in some strange subliminal way. Suddenly shots ring out from the television and there's pandemonium.

The television shows a scene of confusion. Jim walks out, looking at the TV, struck down with his foreknowledge and his inability to do anything about it.

In their bedroom upstairs that night, Jim gently wakes Liz and holds her.

She clings to him, horrified. He caresses her hair. They look in each other's eyes.

He kisses her gently - They start to make love, numbed, needing each other, needing their love in an increasingly terrifying world.

The scene is like a circus. Armed, uniformed guards with walkie-talkies are everywhere. Guards with rifles are on the rooftop. There are crowds of reporters from around the world and many onlookers. Everyone going into the courtroom is frisked by electronic metal detectors.

Jim, accompanied by Mattie, the maid, but not his wife, forges his way through a tightly packed crowd to the prosecution table, joining Al, Susie, Numa, and others from his team. Young law student have come to watch. The crowd is noisy to the point of unruliness. Suddenly there's a hush as everyone cranes their necks to see Clay Shaw and his attorneys, Irvin Dymond and two others, enter the court. Shaw, impeccably dressed, his high handsome cheekbones sucking on an ever- present cigarette in a porcelain filter (smoking in court was allowed then), smiles to those who greet him as if they were not really there and limps past Jim with a stony indifference.

The clerk starts pounding the gavel to call the court to order as Judge Edward Aloysius Haggerty sweeps in and takes the bench. He's a stocky little Jimmy Cagney look alike with fierce blue eyes under bushy brows. The jurors - nine white men and three black men - all dressed in suits and ties, look on.

CUT TO Willie O'Keefe pointing out Clay Shaw.

Irvin Dymond cross-examines O'Keefe.

TIME CUT TO Vernon Bundy, a poor black man, who points at Shaw.

TIME CUT TO Jim looking over at a strange man, Matthews, a kind of lawyer, making notes and conferring with Shaw and Dymond. Matthews seems to have some authority over both men.

Corrie Collins, a black woman who is one of the CORE workers from Clinton, is on the stand.

TIME CUT TO the Town Marshall on the stand.

TIME CUT TO Dymond cross-examining Dean Andrews, shaking his head.

Arguments follow.

TIME CUT TO Charles Goldberg, a mild-looking New York accountant, on the stand with Dymond cross-examing.

We see the faces of people in the courtroom... the judge's face... obviously Goldberg is disturbed (or maybe he is telling the truth, but it doesn't play well)... Jim looks at Al sickly.

TIME CUT TO Jim calling Officer Habighorst to testify.

Habighorst, the clean-cut police officer who booked Clay Shaw on the day of his arrest, starts forward.

This is an ugly surprise for Jim. We see him at the bench arguing loudly with the judge. Susie, Dymond and Al are also there.

FLASHBACK TO 1967, in the New Orleans police station. Shaw is being booked. The press is there and Habighorst is questioning him.

We see a close-up on Habighorst typing this in.

Dymond goes back to Shaw, very please. Shaw smokes, icy. Jim, devastated, sits, feeling it's over.

CUT TO Clay Shaw on the stand. Dymond cross-examines him.

Jim rises slowly out of his chair.

CUT TO later in the trial. A movie screen has been installed for the jury. Jim paces dramatically, as if waiting, casting looks at the door. Members of the press pack the hot room, and a fan turns overhead.

The Zapruder film (8mm) now rolls. We have seen pieces of it before in the opening of the film, but now we see it whole. It is crucial that this piece of film be repeated several times during the trial to drive home a point that is easily lost on casual viewing. The first viewing is silent except for the sound of the clanky projector. It lasts about 25 seconds, and then the lights come on. The jury is shaken. The judge is shaken. The people in the courtroom murmur. Even Clay Shaw is surprised at what he has seen. Jim says nothing, letting the truth of it sink in. Then:

CUT TO a drawing which has been put on a chair for the Jury. Jim has also moved Al, acting as J.F.K., into a chair directly behind the larger Numa, acting as Governor Connally. He demonstrates with a pointer.

Jim walks to a drawing of an overhead view of Dealey Plaza. On it are dots representing locations of the witnesses. He points to each portion. He pauses and looks out into the courtroom - Liz has entered accompanied by Jasper. Quietly she takes a seat. Jim is unbelieving at first, then very moved. He takes a beat, then:

CUT TO: Dr. Peters on the stand.

CUT TO Dr. McClelland on the stand.

FLASHBACK TO: Parkland Hospital Emergency Room on that day in 1963. The doctors work on the President. The wounds on the back of his head are evident but will change later in the autopsy. He is placed in a bronze casket.

CUT TO: the Secret Service team preparing to wheel the casket out. The Dallas Medical Examiner, Dr. Rose, backed by a justice of the peace, bars the way. A furious wrestling match ensues.

The Secret Service agents put the doctor and judge up against the wall at gunpoint and sweep out of the hospital.

FLASHBACK TO: Love Field the same day. We see Air Force One taking off and a photo of L.B.J. being sworn in.

FLASHBACK TO: the Bethesda autopsy room in 1963. The room is crammed with military officers, Secret Service men and, at the center, three intimidated doctors. Pictures are being taken as they remove bullet fragments.

CUT TO: Jim in court with a series of drawings indicating with arrows entry and exit wounds to Kennedy's neck and head. Dr. Finck is on the stand, erect, very precise, and irritated.

FLASHBACK TO: Bethesda autopsy room.

Jim turns away from the jury. His point is made. Finck is no longer on the stand.

There's a pause, and then a murmur from the court. Jim is on a roll and knows it. The faces in the courtroom are with him, absorbed, horrified. The law students are still there, they have been since day one. But it is Liz's interest that touches him the most.

FLASHBACK TO: the Book Depository, 1963. A shooter and two spotters dressed as working men move into the Oswald spot. One spotter produces the Mannlicher-Carcano.

The camera takes the shooter's point of view: we see down the street through a scope. His spotter wears a radio earpiece. The second spotter is working out of the southeast window.

Inside the Dal-Tex Building, a shooter and a spotter dressed as air-conditioning men move into a small second-story textile storage room.

At the picket fence a shooter in a Dallas Police uniform moves into place, aiming up Elm Street. His spotter has a radio to his ear. Another man in a Secret Service suit moves further down the fence.

Part of this team is a coordinator who's flashed security credentials at several people, chasing them out of the parking lot area.

An "agent" in tie and suit moves on the underpass, keeping an eye out.

In the crowd on Elm Street, we catch brief glimpses of the umbrella man and the Cuban, neither of them watching Kennedy, both looking around to their teams. There is a third man, heavyset, in a construction helmet.

J.F.K. waves and turns in slow motion.

From Houston Street we look up at the sixth floor of the Book Depository and see the shooter moving around. Arnold Rowland points him out to his wife.

In the Dallas County Jail, Johnny Powell is one of many convicts housed on the sixth floor - the same height as the men in the Book Depository. We look across to the Depository through cell bars. Johnny and various cell mates are watching two men in the sixth floor of the Depository.

All the shooters tighten, taking aim. It's a tense moment.

The camera is on Kennedy waving. A MONTAGE follows - all the faces in the square that we've introduced in the movie now appear one after the other, watching - the killers, the man with the umbrella, the Newman family, Mary Moorman photographing, Jean Hill, Abraham Zapruder filming it, S.M. Holland, Patrolman Harkness... INTERCUT with the Zapruder and Nix films on J.F.K. in the final seconds coming abreast of the Stemmons Freeway sign.

CUT TO the Dal-Tex shooter firing. We see the back of Kennedy's through his gun sight. Kennedy (stand in) reacts in the Zapruder film.

Everything goes off very fast now. Repeating intercuts are slowed down with shots of Kennedy reacting in the Zapruder film.

CUT TO: the picket fence shooter hitting him from the fence. We see Kennedy (stand in) from the point of view of his telescopic sight. In the Zapruder film, we see Kennedy clutch his throat.

CUT TO: the Dal-Tex shooter. We see Kennedy from his point of view, and the Zapruder film in slow motion.

CUT TO: the sixth floor shooter firing rapidly and missing Kennedy but hitting Connally (stand in).

CUT TO: the umbrella man pumping his umbrella. The Cuban is looking off. The man on the curb in the construction helmet is looking not at J.F.K. but up at the Book Depository.

CUT TO the picket fence shooter. We see J.F.K. from his point of view. He fires, and then we see Kennedy in the Zapruder film flying backwards and to his left in a ferocious, conclusive spray of blood and brain tissue. We repeat the shot.

Kennedy's car speeds off. Jackie is like a crawling animal in a pillbox hat on the back of the car. The people on the other side of the underpass wave innocently as the car speeds through with it's horrifying contents. Pigeons fly off the rooftop of the Book Depository.

CUT TO: sixth floor spotter dumping the Mannlicher - Carcano in a corner as he leaves... and then to the Dal-Tex spotter and shooter, who break down the gun and move out... and then to the spotter with the fence shooter, who quickly breaks down the weapon, throwing it in the trunk of a car parked at the fence. He walks away. The fence shooter, dressed as a policeman, blends with the crowd.

CUT TO: the umbrella man and the Cuban sitting quietly together on the north side of the curb of Elm Street.

CUT TO: stunned, confused, people in the crowd - some lying on the ground, some running for the Grassy Knoll.

Back in the courtroom, patrolman Joe Smith is on the stand.

FLASHBACK TO: the picket fence area where, with his gun drawn, Smith rushes across to a man standing by a car who reacts quickly, producing credentials. He is one of the hoboes. There's a strange moment when the camera moves from Smith's eyes to the man's fingernails.

Back in the courtroom, Liz is totally absorbed. Jim exchanges looks with her. The camera movies in for a close - up of Jim.

FLASHBACK TO: the three hoboes being arrested ... marching across Dealey Plaza. The hoboes look familiar now.

FLASHBACK TO: men in suits, ties, and hats moving people out of the parking lot area ... turning a policeman back.

FLASHBACK TO: the Cuban, putting away a radio, and the umbrella man, who now rise and leave the area in opposite directions.

In the second floor lunchroom of the Book Depository we see Carolyn Arnold, a pregnant secretary, crossing past Oswald, who is in a booth.

On the sixth floor of the depository, Bonnie Ray Williams is eating a chicken lunch, alone.

On the street, Arnold Rowland and his wife look up at the sixth floor windows and we see, from their point of view, two shadowy figures...

We see footage of J.F.K. coming up Houston - waving.

Oswald walks into the second floor lunchroom as policeman Marrion Baker runs in, gun at his side. He is about 30 feet from Oswald. Roy Truly, the superintendent, runs in a moment later.

Oswald reacts as if hearing it for the first time. Truly and Baker continue running up the stairs. Oswald proceeds to get a Coke and continues out of the room.

CUT TO: the sixth floor, where we see Oswald as the shooter. After firing, he runs full speed for the stairs, stashing the rifle on the other side of the loft. Our camera follows him roughly down stairs - we hear the loud sound of his shoes banging on the hollow wood - to the lunchroom, where Patrolman Baker and Superintendent Truly run in. Then they start to repeat the same action as seen in the previous scene.

CUT TO: the second floor. Oswald ambles past Mrs. Reid, a secretary in the second floor office, on his way out, Coke bottle in hand and wearing his usual dreamy look... there's a lingering close - up on his face.

Outside, we see Oswald stroll out the door of the Book Depository into the crowd. He heads for the bus stop to the east.

Back in the courtroom, Jim continues speaking:

FLASHBACK TO: Oswald's boarding house. Oswald enters his room, passing Earlene Roberts, the heavyset white housekeeper.

The camera closes in on Oswald's perplexed face. Earlene peeks out the shades as she hears two short honks on a horn.

Outside is a black police car driven by Tippit. Also in the car is the fence shooter, dressed as a Dallas policeman. The car drives by, honks twice, waits, then moves away. During this visual, we see the fence shooter changing his uniform into civilian clothes.

On a street, Oswald walks alone, fast. A police car pulls up alongside him on 10th Street. Oswald leans on the passenger side of the window. Officer Tippit, suspicious, gets out to question him. Oswald pulls his .38 revolver and shoots him down in the street with 5 shots.

Domingo Benavides, hidden in his truck only a few yards away, watches as another unidentified man (not seen before) shoots and walks away.

We see Acquilla Clemons, a black woman, looking on. She watches as two men kill Tippit. One of them resembles the fence shooter. The other one is a mystery figure, seen before in the fringes. The men walk off quickly in opposite directions. We notice a policeman's uniform hanging in the back seat of Tippit's car.

CUT TO: Policeman Poe marking the bullets.

On a Dallas avenue near the Texas Theatre, Oswald moves along, spooked. Police cars roar by with sirens blaring. Johnny Brewer, in a shoestore, spots him and follows him.

Outside the Texas Theatre Oswald walks past the cashier, who is out on the sidewalk watching the police cars go by. A double feature is playing - Cry of Battle with Van Heflin and War is Hell. He goes in.

CUT TO: 30 officers arriving at the theatre in a fleet of patrol cars.

Inside the theatre, Cry of Battle is on the screen. Twelve to fourteen spectators sit scattered between the balcony and ground floor. Brewer leads the officers onto the stage and the lights come on. He points to Oswald.

The cops advance on Oswald, who jumps up, as if expecting to be shot.

Scared, Oswald takes a swing at a policeman. He pulls out his gun. The officers close in on him from the rear and front. A wrestling and shoving match ensues. One officer gets a chokehold on Oswald and another one hits him.

Outside the theatre, Oswald, his eye blackened, is led out by the phalanx of officers. They are surrounded by an angry crowd.

At the Dallas police station, Dallas Police Captain Will Fritz takes a call from a high official in Washington. In the background we notice Lee Oswald continuing to be questioned by federal agents. We hear Johnson's distinctive Texas drawl but we never see him.

The camera closes in on Oswald in the background. He turns to an unseen Deputy, sad.

In an underground police garage, we see Jack Ruby being allowed in via an interior staircase by his police contact. He moves towards the outer edge of reporters, nervous.

Oswald comes out with his two guards. We see a repeat of the assassination in stop time... Ruby's eyes, Oswald's... do they recognize each other?

We see Oswald dying on the floor of the police station. A paramedic pushes in and starts administering artificial respiration, which only aggravates the internal hemorrhaging.

At a Texas cemetery, Oswald's mother weeps. Oswald is buried with a few people present, but there are no details, no dates. We see Marina whisked out by agents.

CUT TO Kennedy's funeral, which, in contrast, attracts thousands of mourners.

FLASHBACK TO X: reading about it in the New Zealand Airport, and then back to the courtroom in 1969.

Liz watches, moved. Susie, Al and Numa are also there for the summation. Even Lou Ivon has come back to support his friend.

The camera follows Jim around the courtroom.

The camera holds on onlookers shuffling and murmuring. Clay Shaw smirks, smoking his cigarette. The very grandiosity of the charge works in his favor. Jim is falling apart from built - up strain and fatigue. He looks over at Liz, gathering his spirit.

He approaches the jury.

He returns to the table and sits. The courtroom is still.

CUT TO: later in the same courtroom. The jury files in, having reached a verdict. Jim, prepared, sits with his staff and Liz. The jury foreman enters the courtroom.

There's jubilation and commotion in the Court. Shaw stands, happily shaking hands all over... Members of the press run for the phones. In the corridor outside the courtroom, the press interviews the jury foreman.

The camera moves to Jim, who walks out past the banks of reporters. TV lights are in his face. Liz is by his side.

He and Liz squeeze hands as they walk on.

Jim waits on the same park bench as earlier in the film, overlooking the Mall or the Lincoln Monument... as X walks up, a little grayer, a little more stooped, wearing ill fitting civilian clothes.

CUT TO: a New York lunch club or executive dining room. From the window we have a towering view of the City. Four men in their 50's to 70's - old men, rich men, talk at a quiet table. Their figures are shadowy and we overhear their conversation obliquely, across faces flared out by sun bouncing off the skyscraper window.

Looks pass among them. There's a pause, and then...

There is a breathless moment with the thought in the air.

FLASHBACK TO: the Pentagon in 1962.

We see a general meeting with another general. They talk.

FLASHBACK TO: the White House, 1962. A general talks to one of Kennedy's staff - a bespectacled, bright young Harvard type.

In a White House office, Lyndon Johnson meets with a cabinet member, a contractor, and two military men.

The camera shows Washington, D.C. buildings from strange angles. The feeling is still, weird, angled, alien. The buildings are twisted.

In a Pentagon office, a man in civilian clothing is on the phone, his back to the screen. This is Mr. Y, X's superior officer. Shadows pervade the room. An unshuttered window overlooks the Potomac River and the White House.

FLASHBACK TO: one of the hobo pictures. Next to the freight entrance of the Book Depository, Y, in a dark suit, is nonchalantly walking past the hoboes, his back to us. The camera closes in on Y.

FLASHBACK TO: the White House, 1963. Johnson sits across the shadowed room with Lodge and others. His Texas drawl rises and falls. He signs something unseen.

CUT TO: Documentary footage of - U.S. Marines arriving in full force on the beaches of Danang, March 8, 1965... as another era begins and our movie ends.

ON A BLACK SCREEN WE READ:

** In 1975, VICTOR MARCHETTI, former executive assistant to the CIA's deputy director, stated that during high - level CIA meetings during Shaw's trial in 1969, CIA director RICHARD HELMS disclosed that CLAY SHAW and DAVID FERRIE had worked for the Agency, and asked his assistants to make sure Mr. Shaw received Agency help at his trial.

** In 1979, RICHARD HELMS, director of covert operations in 1963, admitted under oath that CLAY SHAW had Agency connections.

** It is now known that in 1963, U.S. military intelligence controlled more agents than the CIA and had almost as much money to spend. It surfaced in the 1970's that the Army had long been conducting surveillance and keeping files on thousands of private citizens in the name of national security. The prime targets were dissident-left-wingers of the kind Oswald appeared to be.

** CLAY SHAW died in 1974 of supposed lung cancer. No autopsy was allowed.

** WILLIAM SULLIVAN, Assistant Director of the FBI, died in the early morning hours of November 9,177 when he was mistaken for a deer in an open field in New Hampshire. Shortly before his death, Sullivan had a preliminary hearing with the HSCA.

** GEORGE DE MOHRENSCHILDT committed suicide just hours after HSCA investigator Gaeton Fonzi located him.

** In November, 1969 JIM GARRISON was re-elected to a third term as District Attorney of Orleans Parish. In June of 1971, he was arrested by Federal Agents on charges of allowing payoffs on pinball gambling by organized crime. In September of 1973, after defending himself in Federal Court, he was quickly found not guilty of charges that appear to have been framed against him. Less than six weeks later, he was narrowly defeated for a fourth term as District Attorney.

** In 1978, Garrison was elected Judge of the Louisiana State Court of Appeal in New Orleans. He was re - elected in 1988. To this date, he has brought the only public prosecution in the Kennedy killing.

** ELIZABETH and Jim were divorced in 1978. He now lives in the same house he lived in with Elizabeth. She lives a block away. Their five children are grown.

** SOUTHEAST ASIA: 58,000 American lives, 2 million Asian lives, $220 billion spent, 10 million Americans air - lifted there by commercial aircraft, more than 5,000 helicopters lost, 6.5 million tons of bombs dropped.

** A Congressional Investigation from 1976 - 1979 found a "probable conspiracy" in the assassination of John F. Kennedy and recommended the Justice Department investigate further. As of 1991, the Justice Department has done nothing. The files of the House Select Committee on Assassinations are locked away until the year 2029.

The camera moves onto the mottoes chiselled in the walls of the National Archives in Washington, D.C.:

"STUDY THE PAST"

"PAST IS PROLOGUE"

"ETERNAL VIGILANCE IS THE PRICE OF LIBERTY"

DEDICATED TO THE YOUNG, IN WHOSE SPIRIT THE SEARCH FOR TRUTH MARCHES ON.

FADE OUT: