What to Watch on the 60th Anniversary of JFK’s Assassination

Cold Case JFK (2013)

Treating the JFK assassination like any other unsolved cold case, the team from Nova taps forensic scientists and pathologists to use cutting-edge technology (laser scanning, ballistics testing) to examine the case detached from raw emotion and wild conjecture. The findings are eye-opening if not quite conclusive. The highlight is a look at X-rays of the late president retrieved from the National Archives. 

Watch it: on Apple TV

Lee Harvey Oswald: 48 Hours to Live (2013)

Was Oswald the lone gunman, a patsy or just the unluckiest man to walk the face of the Earth? This TV docudrama (based on a book by Steve Gillon) chronicles the comings, goings and odd movements of the enigmatic figure in the days and hours between the morning of Nov. 22 and his murder at the hands of Jack Ruby while in police custody. Experts discuss the facts and point out the evidence that has mysteriously vanished. Not surprisingly, it will leave you with more questions at the end than you had going in … which jibes with just about everything else surrounding the case.

Watch it: on Vudu

Parkland (2013)

Paul Giamatti, Billy Bob Thornton and Zac Efron star in this tense procedural about the chaos that gripped Dallas’ Parkland Hospital when the fatally wounded president was rushed into the ER. What makes the movie fascinating is the unusual and unlikely setting it uses to view an event that most of us thought we already knew everything about. 

Watch it: on Starz

Killing Kennedy (2013)

National Geographic tapped Rob Lowe as their JFK (above average in the lookalike department) and Ginnifer Goodwin as the First Lady, Jackie. This compressed made-for-TV movie adapted from Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard’s bestselling book is a long way from both the filmmaking fireworks of Oliver Stone’s JFK, but there is something undeniably compelling about the performances and the sickeningly ominous buildup to the tragic moment.

Watch it: on Prime Video

JFK Assassination: The Roger Craig Story (2016)

This compelling 20-minute documentary reveals how Dallas Deputy Sheriff Roger Dean Craig, who was on duty Nov. 22, was ordered not to take part in the security detail for the presidential motorcade in any way and raises legitimate questions about whether his testimony was altered by the Warren Commission investigating the assassination.

Watch it: on YouTube

Jackie (2016)

Natalie Portman delivers the most haunting performance of her career as the widowed First Lady in director Pablo Larrain’s unsettling drama. It feels like we’re eavesdropping on a conversation we shouldn’t be privy to as Portman, who nabbed an Oscar nomination for the role, politely spars with a journalist played by Billy Crudup. She seems, by turns, calculating and shattered with grief. It’s a fascinating portrait, even if it plays with the truth and bends it for its own purposes. What those purposes are is hard to discern exactly, but it’s a mesmerizing film to sit through.

Watch it: on Prime Video

JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass (2021)

Thirty years after the release of the triumphant JFK, Oliver Stone returns to his singular obsession. The director paces through Dealey Plaza, speaks to experts, raises a set of new questions about the 20th century’s most enduring mystery and makes us challenge our assumptions once again. A fascinating encore. 

Watch it: on Paramount+

Paramount+ pays AARP a royalty for use of its intellectual property and provides a discount to AARP members.