Point
Of Order! (Documentary)
Picture: C
Sound: C Extras: C+ Film: B
So many people discuss McCarthyism and if you want to see
why Ann Coulter is totally wrong for saying anything positive about the senator
whose name is infamous with political witch hunts, then you should see Emile de
Antonio’s Point Of Order!
Without hardly any narration, without underhanded manipulation, without
any kind of slanting of the editing, de Antonio found a bunch of the kinescope
footage already shot and simply put in together in roughly chronological order
from the stationery cameras set up without too much thought in the earliest
days of television.
We see suspicious testimony, suspicious last-minute
submissions of “evidence” and how enough people in power could not take
McCarthy’s lies and pompousness anymore.
The turn occurred when he decided to go after the military itself,
saying it had been infiltrated by Communists (he never says what kind ever, it
is just assumed Communism was mono-centric and always came from the Soviet
Union) and trying to position a young military soldier to get a position where
McCarthy would use him as a puppet to recklessly go after more people to
increase his dogmatic position and attention.
The 97 minutes does a fine job of summarizing much of the five weeks of
hearings that eventually lead to the end of McCarthy’s reign of terror. Most amazing, it reminds us of how now; some
in the media are repeating this history all to our detriment. That makes Point Of Order! Required
viewing more than ever.
The 1.33 X 1 image was finalized on 35mm film for
theatrical distribution, but began on kinescopes, which are old film copies off
of TV picture tubes. The quality is
pretty good for that, in part because doing this back in 1963 essentially
preserved the footage early on. The
Dolby Digital 2.0 sound is monophonic and not that far off the original audio,
which has its inherent flaws for what was captured at that time. Extras include a commentary by de Antonio,
notes from his book about his career, the original trailer for this and a
couple of other New Yorker titles.
- Nicholas Sheffo
