The Kennedys
Reelz Network
3 Discs, 8 Episodes
TV-MA
1.78 AR, 1080P Presentation
DTS-MA 5.1 Audio
The Story & Back-Story...
It’s hard to pass a week without discussing the life of the Kennedy’s in America. A recent death in their family of a relation makes national news. Revelations about Jackie Kennedy’s inner feelings becomes news cycle after news cycle. A dynamic family with a fantastic political story, they’ve been the subject of movies, miniseries, conspiracy theories, books..
We focus on the Kennedy family because we are fascinated not just with their successes but with the failures as well. In fact, I have often believed that the reason why the Kennedy family remains so interesting is especially because of the horrific loss and tragic failures.
When The Kennedy’s Mini-series was originally prepared by The History Channel, it looked as though it would make an effort to deal with the historical events in a way that was largely true; lightly fictionalized; but a way to make us relate to the dynasty. It wasn’t long after the mini-series was put to bed before controversy struck. The Kennedy family, unhappy with some of the portrayals, specifically of Jackie & John’s relationship, put out protest. The History Channel dropped it like a hot potato. For a while, there was discussion the mini-series would move to Showtime. Then CBS. Then it was nowhere. Until finally, it aired on the upstart ReelZ network in the early spring.
The cast is very well assembled; Joe Kennedy, portrayed by Tom Wilkinson maintains a real heft of his role and he takes over the screen when he’s on it. The casting is quite good; Katie Holmes makes an affable Jackie; Greg Kinnear is a passable JFK – though I found him to be the weak spot. Bobby Kennedy, effectively portrayed by Barry Pepper becomes the other driving performance of this story.
Jackie and Joseph discuss the family she's married into
In fact, if you viewed this as a historical telling, you’d say JFK is “along for the ride” while Bobby, Joseph and others push for what they want. Only after he was on a role for the presidency did JFK seemingly fully engage or be interested in his own prospects. Historically I’m not sure I buy that reasoning. But it makes for effective drama, and it’s as plausible as anything else. The portrayal of Jackie as a woman who “knows” that her husband has affairs and just deals with it has a ring of truth that’s hard to deny, though still scandalous.
The directors and cast discuss frequently how they tried to respect the property, discuss with historians and sources to develop how they wanted to portray the Kennedy’s. Frankly, in comparison to numerous films about the Kennedy’s I found this portrayal, warts and all, probably more in line with reality then a great number of films. It’s not always pretty and it won’t always make you love the characters but it’s well scripted and well acted.
Jack in the Oval Office discusses Bay of Pigs options
Video Quality 4.5 / 5
The Kennedys ships on 3 Blu-rays, with 3 episodes on the first two discs, 2 and extras on the last disc. This actually gives the film some real room to stretch it’s legs. Titles are presented in 1.78 AR at an AWBR of around 34.2Mbps (this varies a small bit title to title). The presentation is effective, and the film quality is quite good. As far as the transfer goes, this is a near perfect rendition of the video as it was originally presented on Reelz.. and for those of us who only get ReelZ in SD, this is a treat. There are, however, issues with the way it was originally filmed. Some scenes – especially those in the oval office with large bay windows present moments where there is washout and just too much light on one end of the room, scuttling details. For a transfer, that’s hard to deal with being a cinematography issue. I found the video and especially the shots at their homes to be very effective and well done.
A flashback to Joseph making changes, played by Wilkinson to perfection
Audio Quality 5 / 5
Presented in 5.1 DTS-MA, this is a very dialog heavy script that focuses mostly on the center channel. But you have to keep that in mind when you buy it. The dialog presented is crisp, clear and always understandable. Wilkinson’s voice booms and resonates a room when he yells. Echoes that go through a hallway drift back and around you. These are very minor effects that would be lost on an action oriented film but they help deliver exactly
Bobby confronts Jack to demand him to take control of the situation in the south
Extras: 1.5 / 5
The Kennedy’s From Story to Film (40:54) Presented in 1080I. This is actually broken up into several segments, and I have to say, I found this to be a pretty poor extra. Almost all of them ended up drifting back to the theme of “it was so amazing..” By the time I had went through all of them I felt as though ReelZ had missed out – this was a chance to do something really unique. Frankly, I would have be interested in the behind the scenes of getting this thing on the air; a discussion of the controversy; or even a real documentary. The extras segment here was the kind of thing you’d see on a half an hour HBO special promoting an upcoming film. It not only didn’t tell me anything new about the film, but it just didn’t go anywhere.
Final Score: 4 / 5
As much as I was disappointed with the extras, the product itself is actually worth a watch. The presentation is quite good and the way the story plays out is quite effective. There are some real problems with it; while the extras tout Kinnear, I found that I was far more impressed by the performances by Wilkinson and Pepper who dominate their time on the screen when they appear.
