Parkland doesn’t actually showcase John and Jackie together through the assassination, and instead focuses on the emotional tool of his shooting on the doctors, FBI, police and the general public. Why did you find it more compelling to tell that side of the story, as opposed to the events leading up to his death, or the straightforward investigation into his murder?
Peter Landesman: Those little-known details were amazingly powerful and integral into understanding what that weekend was like. I built the movie around characters who took the audience on the ride, as though the experience was happening to them. The hospital was an obvious general element, as it was the core and engine of the movie. Then the others, like the one with Lee Harvey Oswald’s brother, the FBI agents and Abraham Zapruder. Their tales and narratives were very specific, but had enormous implications.
The drama starts off by introducing John and Jackie through archival footage as they first arrive in Dallas, before the narrative turns to the assassination. Why did you decide to feature the archives alongside the film’s narrative?
Peter Landesman: Well, I wanted to create a visual language that gave the audience a comfort level of what they were seeing, and that they could rely on and trust. Once I did that, that fell away, and we got into the body of the movie. Ultimately, it was about giving the audience a confidence in the movie and the storytelling.
Parkland featured interesting camera angles and cuts, as the actors’ faces were often obscured. Why did you decide to feature those types of shots in the film?
Peter Landesman: I wanted to give the camera the position of almost being a character, with very heavy subjectivity.
Parkland played at such film festivals as the Toronto International Film Festival and the Venice Film Festival. What was your experience of taking the film to the festivals?
Peter Landesman: It was fun and exhausting. To show the film to big audiences for the first time was a pretty humbling experience. You make a film for the audience; you don’t make it for yourself. These were audiences of 2,000 people or more, and it was a very powerful experience to watch it with them, and understand their relationship to it.
What kind of responses did you receive from the audiences at the festivals?
Peter Landesman: (We had) standing ovations, and (the viewers were) shocked and stunned. Every big audience I’ve seen this with was deeply moved by it.
What do you hope audiences will take away from Parkland?
Peter Landesman: I hope that they can take away the experience of this having happened to them, and as if this was something that happened in front of, and around, them, as if they were participants. People who were alive then will automatically go back there, emotionally. I was in lower Manhattan on 9/11, and when I see films that refer to that, it viscerally brings me back. That experience of mine was a big part of why I made the film; I wanted to give audiences that experience. I think younger audiences can relate to this, and I’ve seen it. They’re shocked by it, as there’s a universality to the story, that could be about this or 9/11. When something significant happens to people, this is how they behave.
In the future, are you interested in continuing to tell political stories like Parkland?
Peter Landesman: I want to tell great stories; some of them will be political, and some of them won’t. My sensibility is in that, so I wouldn’t be surprised if I did more of those types of films.
That concludes our interview, but we’d like to thank Peter Landesman for taking the time to speak with us. Make sure to catch Parkland when it hits theaters on Friday, October 4.