"7 DAYS IN MAY." INCREDIBLY POWERFUL FILM- STILL. WOW!

[Joe Bauer]

Just viewed it again.

Ominously prescient.

After the fact?

 

 

Edited September 4, 2023 by Joe Bauer

[James DiEugenio]

Are you sure about that Joe?

I know he was happy to let Frankenheimer use the White House as a backdrop.

I did not know that he asked him to make the film.

I also know that the Lancaster character is based on Lemay.

Edited September 4, 2023 by James DiEugenio

[Joseph Backes]

Supposedly, JFK asked Kirk Douglas if he was going to make Seven Days in May into a movie.  Douglas soon afterwards bought the movie rights and then asked Frankenheimer to direct.  

See - https://www.historytoday.com/miscellanies/john-f-kennedys-warning-republic#:~:text='Do you intend to make,The Manchurian Candidate%2C to direct.

 

[Benjamin Cole]

3 hours ago, Joe Bauer said:

Just viewed it again.

Ominously prescient.

After the fact?

 

 

To all: This film, very worth watching, can be seen on YouTube. 

I think Seven Days depicts the "state of the art" of putsches, or regime-change ops, c. 1964. 

One thing for all to consider is how much more deep the Deep State has become since 1964, and the ways to ease a President out of power more veiled yet effective. The 1964 version looks primitive. 

Today, erroneously, people conflate "fascism" with nationalism and the "far right"--so says Wikipedia, for example. 

But true fascism is a blending of corporatism and the state, which in today's universe of worldwide transnationals translates into enforced globalism. 

We know now the government and corporations---fascism, in action---have been controlling social media algorithms and censorship regimes. As for legacy media, it it hopeless. 

Keep an open mind, and bear with people who have different points of view.  If you find yourself hating "the other side"...ask yourself why. Are you just being a pawn? 

 

 

[David Von Pein]

http://classic--movies.blogspot.com/2011/07/seven-days-in-may.html

[Joe Bauer]

8 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Are you sure about that Joe. 

I know he was happy to let Frankenheimer us the White House as a backdrop.

I did not know that he asked him to make the film.

I also know that the Lancaster character is based on Lemay.

After reading some of the responses I realize I am wrong about JFK directly asking Frankenheimer to direct the film.

As always I should have done at least a quick search into the historical record of the film's genesis.

Obviously I need to edit my thread title.

Still, this film really does grab you regards the similarities between JFK and the highest ranking U.S. military officers of the time who probably hated JFK and seriously considered him a threat.

I noticed a film structure sound effect in 7 DAYS IN MAY similarly used in Oliver Stone's 1993 film "JFK."

That of the tense military drum rolls.

Often used in 7 DIM and as well in the beginning of "JFK" as a tension building effect leading up to the booming shot sound indicating JFK's head being blown off in Dealey Plaza on 11,22,1963.

[Joe Bauer]

Kennedy thought Seven Days in May should become a movie. Arthur Schlesinger, a presidential adviser, said Kennedy wanted the film ‘made as a warning to the generals’. The president reached out to Hollywood contacts and learnt Kirk Douglas, the star and producer of Spartacus, wanted to adapt the novel for the screen. In reality, Douglas was on the fence. He liked the ‘risky’ material but had been advised by peers ‘to stay away from it’ for fear of offending the government. That changed when Kennedy accosted Douglas at a Washington banquet. ‘Do you intend to make a movie out of Seven Days in May?’, the president asked, before explaining why it would make ‘an excellent movie’.

Encouraged, Douglas bought the rights and asked John Frankenheimer, who had enjoyed recent success with the Cold War thriller The Manchurian Candidate, to direct. Frankenheimer agreed, sensing an opportunity to show ‘what a tremendous force the military/industrial complex is’. Pierre Salinger, the president’s press secretary, gave the director a tour of the White House for research purposes. He also explained that, for Kennedy, the film represented ‘a warning to the republic’. It was certainly a way of alerting public opinion and, as Schlesinger put it, ‘raise consciousness about the problems involved if the generals got out of control’.

Seven Days in May attracted an all-star cast: Burt Lancaster played the general behind the coup, Ava Gardner his lover, Fredric March the president and Kirk Douglas a military whistleblower. It was filmed over the summer of 1963. One scene was shot in front of the White House with Kennedy’s blessing. The Pentagon, however, denied the production filming permits since Frankenheimer would not submit the script for ‘consideration’, aware that the military authorities would demand changes. Yet the crew still managed to shoot there; Frankenheimer hid a camera inside a van while Douglas, dressed as a colonel, strode incognito into the Pentagon, even saluting a guard on his way in.

 

President Kennedy signs the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, 7 October 1963.

 

During filming, real life imitated fiction. In July 1963 JFK announced that, like the fictional president in Seven Days in May, he had struck a nuclear deal with the Soviet Union. The Test Ban Treaty – the first arms control agreement of the Cold War era – outlawed most nuclear testing. It was seen, by both supporters and detractors, as opening a peace process with the Soviet Union. The British prime minister Alec Douglas-Home deemed it ‘the beginning of the end of the Cold War’. Although it was ratified by the US Senate in September 1963, Kennedy’s treaty was initially opposed by most of the military.
    
Seven Days in May was released in February 1964 and was well-received by audiences and critics. Variety magazine called it ‘realistic’ and ‘provocatively topical’. What did John Kennedy think of the film he had helped get made? He never saw it; he had been assassinated three months earlier.

[Joe Bauer]

A quirky thought occurred to me that the "Colonel William "Mud" Henderson" character in the film ( played by Andrew Duggan ) looked very physically similar to Colonel Fletcher Prouty.

Same height, build, head shape, hair cut and even a facial resemblance.

[Michael Griffith]

On 9/4/2023 at 1:47 AM, Joe Bauer said:

Just viewed it again.

Ominously prescient.

After the fact?

It is worth repeating that we learned years ago that RFK warned the Soviets during the Cuban Missile Crisis that there were senior military officers in the Pentagon who would stage a coup if they found JFK's response intolerable.

Recall, too, that after the Cuban Missile Crisis, McNamara urged JFK to sack JCS members General LeMay and Admiral Anderson because they were insubordinate during the Crisis. JFK said that for political reasons he could not fire both of them, and he let McNamara choose which one to sack. McNamara chose Anderson.

Edited September 5, 2023 by Michael Griffith