Chappaquiddick

This film disappoints. I remember the event quite well and most of the true happenings were covered up and this movie does nothing to add to the truth.

We will never know the complete truth, but money talks and happened in the cover up, but this was not even included in this film. It appears that even 50 odd years later, it is still impossible to get the whole truth, so the Kennedy power still reigns.

A sad day. I feel this movie should not have been released as the speculation will continue, yet a person lost her life and the culprit got away with it.

Ted Kennedy and his memory even today is idolized by various women's groups. This movie shows the truth for those of us who remember his abandonment of Mary Jo and let her die a slow, agonizing death in the car he crashed. And then his contradictory stories in the cover up. The powerful family even reached into the court system to block exhumation of Mary Jo's body, thus helping the extensive coverup. This is a real story about real people and until this movie, the media protected Teddy and his powerful family. More people should see this, the truth should be out there. And Ted Kennedy should not be idolized. He should have faced a jury on manslaughter charges.

There are two tragedies in this film. The first is the death of Mary Jo Koepechne, the young woman left to die in an upturned car in shallow water. The second is Ted Kennedy's ultimate refusal to accept responsibility for his negligence. The fact that the second tragedy works so well in the shadow of the first is a testament to how well the movie is written and performed.

The movie begins with a montage of Kennedy family photos and audio describing the achievements and deaths of Ted's three brothers, Joe Jr., Jack, and Bobby. The implication is that Bobby lives in a world of tragedy already, but that he also lives in the shadows of three brothers. Throughout the film, we hear from Ted, his cousin Joey, the secretaries (including Mary Jo), and even Joe Sr. that Ted either needs to find a way out of those shadows or that he will never be able to get out from them. Ted wants to be his own man, but he can't quite escape the gravitational pull of his family name that, a mere decade before, had dominated American political life.

In seeming preparation for what could be a presidential run, Kennedy rounds up Jack's secretaries in order to try and get them to work for him. He invites them to a small cabin in Martha's Vineyard to drink and participate in a boat race (that Ted embarrassingly loses). The secretaries as a whole, save Mary Jo, have bought into the Kennedy mystique completely, but Mary Jo is scarred by the deaths of the Kennedy brothers and is reticent about coming back into the "family", as Ted puts it. Ted drives her back to town in an effort to continue to try and convince her, but he takes the ill-fated turn and drives off the bridge, overturning the car.

One of his first lines of dialogue after exiting the car cuts right to him. He's gotten out of the car (he doesn't know how) and walked back to the cabin. When he sees his cousin Joey out of sight of everyone else, he says, "I'll never be president." It's not the safety of Mary Jo whom he's left behind, probably dead, that concerns him, but his political future and his ability to live up to the family's expectations.

What follows is something between a comedy of errors and a tragedy as Ted, Joey, and advisors brought in by Joe Sr. work to mitigate the situation with Ted making poor decisions left and right from a sloppily written statement to the police (that gets to the media) to a neck brace that brings nothing but scorn due to its obvious needlessness. All through this, Joey, the faithful cousin lawyer, is Ted's conscience, begging for Ted to do the right thing by calling the police right after the accident, telling the truth, and eventually resigning.

It's the final scene, Ted's address to Massachusetts and the nation, that shows Ted as completely fallen and Joey's complete degradation in the face of Ted's insistence on weathering the storm. Joey has begged Ted to resign, even writing a resignation letter at Ted's request with the expectation that Ted would read it. But it becomes obvious that Ted's not going to do it. His voice seems distant. The lighting is low. There's something wrong, and he tosses Joey's letter aside in favor of the message written by Joe Sr.'s advisors. Joey's ultimate disgrace comes when he is shanghaied into holding up the cue cards for Ted in his final half of the speech. Joey does his duty, but he simply cannot believe what he's seeing and hearing from his friend. He had expected Ted to rise up above the shadow of the Kennedy family by doing what was right, but Ted had fallen in with Joe Sr.'s view of greatness instead.

It's that final scene that really makes the movie, distilling the central conflict within Ted by using Joey perfectly in contradistinction to Ted's actions.

For those that grew up with the Kennedys, and anyone that didn't (ie, everyone) this story needs to be told. I think the movie was done well - acting and production - but that is not the purpose of the movie.

I knew a lot of what happened from reading over the years. But - this was an amazing portrayal, and accessible to the story for those less interested in politics.

The bottom line? At least Ted, (and if you know the history - his father) were very compromised people. They would, in the end, do anything for power no matter who got in their way. (And as the movie shows, there were always people that would work for them, or vote for them, and dismiss the truth that they knew about them.) From all things that have come out - John and Bobby had great similarities (especially with women).

I hope younger people look at this. Ted's faults were his own demons to a great degree - and these were portrayed very well. I would say what we have seen in the last few years is even more damaging to us, and more corrupt. And - if it takes a movie just to say - that people in politics ARE that dirty and DO lie that much - it will be useful for our country.

Nuff said.

Better late than never that the true story of the Chappaquidick coverup gets major attention. For the Kennedys, laws and rules were always for the little people. I'm of a generation old enough to remember Chappaquidick. It's good that the younger crowd gets to see how the Kennedys operate. Disgusting how Ted, backed by his army of fixers and p.r. Hacks, portrays himself and his family as victims, when he was responsible for a young girl's death. My only complaint about the movie is that it's too kind to him, leaning on the "dad made me do it" and the myth of Kennedy family devotion to "public service." As a resident of Massachusetts I am ashamed that after this miscarriage of justice the voters of this state continued to re-elect this execrable miscreant. By the way it's been reported that "powerful people" tried to stop the release of this movie.