When I was a kid, the summers that contained political conventions were real killers. Without all the channels we have today, there was really nothing else to watch if you wanted to skip the Presidential election process.
Back in 1968, when TV networks actually had unbiased news networks, CBS and NBC were the fat cats who ran gavel-to-gavel coverage of the Republican and Democratic National Conventions. ABC, which usually got bigger audiences by simply running a test pattern, decided to counter program by showing merely the highlights. And they also decided to spice things by including nightly discussions between noted Conservative William F. Buckley and renowned Liberal Gore Vidal. And did they ever. According to this documentary "Best of Enemies," ABC's move cleaned up in the ratings.
And, for the most part, it was the very first time that American TV audiences got to see just how polarized our nation was. All thanks to the utterly maniacal rantings and ravings of these two absolute kooks.
Okay, in 2015 and our worlds of Fox News and MSNBC, we know on a nightly basis just how ugly the political debates are in this country. But, in 1968, this was new and even slightly ground breaking. Buckley and Vidal truly hated each other and this came out for all to see over the course of ten nights that summer. I, of course, remember nothing of it. But, thanks to this superlative documentary by Morgan Neville and Robert Gordon, I can relive it all as if I were there.
The ten or so debates between Buckley and Vidal are virtually shown intact and complete. It is an amazingly frank and bitter dialogue that was likely over the heads of John and Jane Q. Public. But it is essentially the first time that some of these issues were raised. And, as a result, it was basically the birth of all the nonsense we see on news networks today---and the beginning of the end of unbiased TV journalism as we used to know it.
The banter between these two gets more and more vicious until the very last meeting where Vidal calls Buckley a "crypto Nazi" and Buckley calls his opponent a "queer." Vidal, always thought to be a homosexual but somewhat closeted, was essentially outed on network television during a time when that specific word was never uttered on the airwaves. You certainly didn't hear it on "The Andy Griffith Show."
"Best of Enemies" is one of those documentaries that leaves you smarter than you were when you came in. Certainly the mark of a truly fine film of this genre. In this marvelous hey day of documentaries in 2015, this one just might be one of the best.
LEN'S RATING: Four stars.
Dinner last night: Sandwich plus German potato salad.
1 comment:
The networks in 1968 were hardly unbiased (they were very liberal, though today's group is worse. But "Uncle Walter" Cronkite was as liberal as they come; he just hid it better.
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