In a piercing performance by Natalie Portman, her portrayal of Jackie Kennedy grasps the vision of director Pablo Larrain in the harrowing reconstruction following the time of her husband’s assassination in 1963.
An up close and personal screening of Portman’s face as Jackie lets us see into the soft yet steely, kind but shrewd depiction of the character. We begin to see Jackie as a figure that was more than a First Lady; she was a Lady who stood her ground. In the moments around her husband’s killing, we see an enigmatic figure that is torn between grief and protocol. Trying to distinguish between her emotions as a wife and a public figure that needs to uphold her position.
The telling of Jackie shows some weeks after the assassination of JFK, where we are first introduced to her through a journalist who is about to interview her. Here, we see the woman who has lost everything, her emotions seem blanketed from trauma. Not only does Portman engage in the reality of a horrific event, she grasps the notion that this was something more, it was personal. Additionally, Larrain addresses the first direction of the film inconspicuously. What we expect as the viewer is to see the assassination in all of its detail at the beginning. A clever adaptation holds off on this, telling a story of the life just after the assassination that then lead up to the graphic event itself; as though it was always a telling event.
More distinguishable is Portman’s ability to mimic Jackie in all aspects of her character, including her speech that demonstrates a performance of complexity and commitment. It is as though she has transitioned into Jackie herself, much like the transition from First Lady to America’s First Widow. Her depiction encompasses the troubles of the 1960s, encapsulating the disruptions within American society as a whole. From the Vietnam and the Cold War, to the Presidential position that Kennedy held that had only been won by a small majority, causing disruptions on home soil is something that resonates in today’s climate. The film does not, however, focus on the issues of politics and policies. Instead, it humanizes the tragedy and plays onto the likening of the Kennedy household to Camelot.
As the title would suggest, but you may have thought otherwise, the perspective comes entirely from Jackie. Her position as a mother, First Lady and now Widow shows the struggle between all of these positions that engrosses us into a position of horror and empathy; as though this is an issue we now all understand; a moment that we might otherwise have been detached from as we understand it from a purely historic moment in time. This reality becomes increasingly gripping in the unforgettable scene, the final moments of the film, as the director chooses wisely to leave the pinnacle moment of the historic event until the last moment.
A grappling moment for the viewer was to see Jackie as a strong-willed character holding her own amongst some of the most powerful men in office. Although, the shrilling moment when she tells the journalist who comes to interview her account of the events that preceded some few weeks before, that ‘nothing’s ever mine, not to keep’. It was here that we understood why she was so forceful and strong-willed; she kept her dignity and her personal accounts, as she wanted them for the public to see. She often rewrote what had been noted of her. More shrewdly, whilst standing in her infamous pink Chanel suit with her matching pillbox hat, she refused to change, displaying the not even dried blood stains of her skirt and hosiery in order to ‘let them see what they’ve done’. In this moment, we witness how a woman more famous than Monroe or Hepburn is put in the middle of a social and political situation. There is no beginning middle or end to this movie. Well, there is an end of course, in more than one sense of the word. Rather, it is a harrowing portrayal of a Lady put in the middle of cataclysmic event.
The film perfectly situates Portman’s portrayal alongside an uncanny JFK, played by Caspar Phillipson, who enters in occasionally as well as signifying the importance of Robert F. Kennedy, played by Peter Saarsgard. Portman overwhelmingly captures the trauma of this event. Her performance can be subject to scrutiny but she well and truly demonstrates the talent out wittingly underscoring her multiple capabilities used to tie together one complex character.
Film is screening at Hyde Park Picture House (only £5.50 for students) until February 9th. An amazing setting to witness such a telling.
Main cover image: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/tiff-2016-slow-market-not-927386
Image 1: http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2016/12/iconography
Image 2: http://www.artribune.com/arti-performative/cinema/2016/12/top-ten-miglio…
Image 3: http://www.denverpost.com/2016/12/14/movie-review-jackie-natalie-portman/