Bobby (DVD, 2007, Widescreen)

One would think the movie Bobby would be about the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. It was not. It was about the 5 other people who were shot that night in 1968 at the Ambassador Hotel in L.A.. Problem is the 5 were pure fiction. The danger of this movie is it distorts history to promote a social agenda. No actor played the part of RFK. His part was from actual film clips which gives the film the illusion of being a documentary of the 5 people who were shot. Down here in Texas we are told the reason to shoot someone is the @&# deserved it. Emilio Estevez made up 5 people he felt deserved to be shot. One victim was a draft dogger. At time of war a draft dogger is on the bottom of the list of character. Next was a misguided youth who was more interested in finding a source of LSD to get stoned that doing his job of finding votes for RFK. The sole female to be shot was a rich white woman..a real Shallow Sal.. who was more interested in picking the right shoes than the right President. And then there was the most deserving person to be shot..a white racist. And what was his sin? He was in charge of staff at the Ambassador. They were short handed because of the RFK visit. It was election day. He decided to only allow employees that were citizens time off to vote. For that decision he was fired as a racist. That was just one nail in his coffin. On the chance that viewers might sympathize with his decision..they also made him a rat. He told the wife of the guy that fired him her husband was running around on her. The dual flaws made him a prime target. The least deserving to be shot was an illegal immigrant. Guess the writer needed a balance..if you shoot a racist you need to shoot an immigrant.

Don't shoot the messenger. I did not create or shoot them...Emilio Estevez did.

Other than RFK, who were the 5 real victims of the shootings at the Ambassador that fateful night in 1968? Were they the flawed characters so deserving of being shot as the victims in Bobby? Not at all. They were good people at the wrong place at the wrong time. One was Paul Schrade of the UAW. William Weisel was an ABC TV manager. Ira Goldstein was a reporter. Elizabeth Evans was a guest of White House Press Secretary Pierre Salinger. Irwin Stroll was a teenage volunteer. Bobby was their story. It should not have been stolen from them. Their reputation should not have been compromised by more juicy victims for the sake of flavor.

Robert Kennedy was an important figure in American history. His life and his death need be treated with respect. Estevez weaves a fiction around actual events so cleverly that it gives the illusion of being a chronicle of that sad day. The movie ended by saying the 5 victims survived..yet gave no acknowledgment to the real victims. RFK stood for truth and fairness. The events surrounding his death deserved better than fiction. Bobby was an average movie that could have been great. The movie Bobby needed to be more like the man Bobby and less like Hollywood.