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J. Christopher Schnell is a professor of history at Southeast ~Missouri State University.

On November 22, 1963, someone shot and killed President John F. Kennedy. I learned of the assassination as a Senior leaving my 1:00 French class at Kansas State University. In the years that followed, I earned a Ph.D. in American Political History but my special project always focused on JFK, for whom I worked during the 1960 presidential campaign.

When I became a professor at Southeast Missouri State in 1970, I enlisted my students in researching the assassination. In 1974 and again in 1978, I spent several hours meeting with and listening to Harvey Yazijian, whose Assassination Information Bureau helped build popular demand for a congressional investigation of the Kennedy murder. It was Yazijian who showed me for the first time the complete Abraham Zapruder film the crucial evidence that proved the Warren Commission wrong about the direction of the shots that caused the President's fatal wounds. In 1979, the House of Representatives Assassination Committee concluded that conspirators probably killed JFK and called for further investigation.

None ever occurred, however, and I considered the subject closed until Oliver Stone resurrected the entire controversy late in 1991. Stone's movie, "JFK", effectively gives the conspiracy advocates equal time with the Warren Commission. Backed by a brilliant supporting cast, Kevin Costner stars as New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison, who concluded that Kennedy rode into the middle of a coup d'etat "killing zone" arranged by the military-industrial complex and^\the Central Intelligence Agency.

Stone does not prove who shot Kennedy. ~He does renew the Kennedy conspiracy controversy "the story that won't go away."

"A picture speaks a thousand words," Jim Garrison tells the Clay Shaw jury. Although Garrison is describing the Zapruder film, he is addressing also the American people. Stone, like previous conspiracy advocates, uses Zapruder to effectively destroy the Warren Commission's main argument that a single "miracle bullet" (Exhibit #399) struck both Kennedy and Texas Governor John B. Connally. This bullet magically appeared (in pristine condition) on a stretcher in Parkland Hospital.

The film's greatest weakness also is confined endemically to conspiracy literature as Stone picks and chooses which theories he prefers to add to Garrison's hypothesis. The Vietnam analogy seems to fit this description best. Stone also shows fairness in allowing the Clay Shaw jury to groan in response to Garrison's grand conspiracy theory.

Some critics (mostly political columnists~ ~ also groaned. George Will, Joseph Sobran, Edwin Yo~der and even former President Gerald R. Ford (who came out of retirement to defend his role on the Warren Commission) attacked "JFK." Stone responded to ~~this barrage by calling for the opening of closed (until 2029) files of the House Assassinations Committee. "Trust the people with the truth" essentially is his message.

"JFK" is not great history. It is a great film that ~delivers a powerful historical message that deserves an international audience. The Golden Globe Association already has awarded "JFK" four nominations including Best Director and Best Actor for Stone and Costner. One critic already declared the film the odds-on favorite for "Best Motion Picture." The Academy Awards ceremony occurs in April. We shall see.

In the historical realm separated from Hollywood, the film adds little to our knowledge of who killed JFK or why.

Jack Ruby murdered the "paranoid schizophrenic" identified by the Warren Commission as Lee Harvey Oswald before he could testify. Dallas police took no notes during his twelve-hour interrogation. When investigators later attempted to examine the evidence, they found all the files closed until well into the twenty-first century. The President's brain is missing! Numerous witnesses disappeared shortly after the assassination. Is it not surprising that students of this historical event become infuriated a~nd disenchanted with their government?

Films like "JFK" belong in the same category as ~~~~~~"All The President's Men", "Seven Days in May" and even "Dr. Strangelove." They make us think. Although propagandistic and inherently capitalistic by nature, they stimulate an interest in how our government functions. Surely that cannot be a bad thing.

"You are damaging the credibility of the country," a government agent tells one of Garrison's assistants. This is the classic argument against Stone and his colleagues. But this is what makes life great in a democracy protected by the First Amendment's freedom of speech and press. "The truth hurts," Stones rebuttal argues. But the truth probably lies somewhere between the government and its critics.

"Who shot JFK and why?" Nobody knows. Joe Pesci (playing coconspirator David Ferrie) summarizes our dilemma by exclaiming: "It's a mystery wrapped in an enigma not even the shooters knew~!" Perhaps we shall never know.