ABSTRACT
The Cold War was the era of paranoia, from the very real fears of nuclear war to the absurd fears of domestic “Communist subversion.” But the fact is that politics in general is a paranoid game. The assassination of Archduke Ferdinand precipitated a World War. The assassination of 35th President caused a shudder through the culture and a sense of incredulity that such a monstrous act could have been carried out by someone acting alone. The shots fired at the President’s motorcade from a high floor by Lee Harvey Oswald, the live-on-television murder of Oswald a few days later, the deaths of various other people connected. However tenuously with the assassination, the subsequent Warren Commission report that held back crucial information—all created a pervasive sense of uneasy disbelief. Oliver Stone’s 1991 film JFK pulls these theories together and presents not so much conspiracy theory of its own but a strong push for inquiry into the competing truths of the event.
