I saw a movie yesterday
…and I remembered.
I remembered a man from the past. I remembered a man who entered politics as a young man, but who grew and matured. A man who entered the Department of Justice at a time when that was a scarce commodity. An eager, enthusiastic young man who saw disappointment and loss, and grew. Unlike many politicians of his day (and most politicians of today) he was not afraid to admit mistakes and to learn from them.
The movie was “Bobby.” The man is Robert F Kennedy. Today there’s a lot of myth, caricature, and just plain misinformation about the man. I’m not sure this movie does anything siginificant to dispel any of it, but that’s not the point. If you’re too young to remember Bobby, if you didn’t live those years, this movie may not add much to your understanding. But pay attention, not to the fictionalized parts of it, but rather to the clips from speeches and press reports.
The movie is about Robert F Kennedy’s last day, but it’s only peripherally about Bobby himself, and I think that what he would have wanted. Other people were wounded at the same time he was killed, and the movie centers around their lives, the events of their day that led them to that place and time, that led them to their appointment with a bullet. These people, from a busboy to a hotel manager to socialites and the powerful, mattered also. And Bobby would have been the first to insist they should be the heart of the story, not him.