The Attempted Assassination That Inspired An Attempted Assassination

                                                   George Wallace Shot

                                               Taxi Driver Political Rally Scene

Reading Chapter 9 of the Stone/Kuznick book The Untold History of the United States I realized that it barely mentions George Wallace. Just a 2 sentence mention and that’s it. Nothing more. What the book doesn’t even say that Wallace was shot by a gunman. But Wallace was. George Wallace was shot by Arthur Bremmer in Laurel, MD on May 15, 1972. Growing up near Laurel I know the area well. It’s the open shopping center that contains the Giant and even as child I remember my parents telling me the story. But what my parents never told me or didn’t know was that event inspired the movie Taxi Driver. Considering the site where Wallace was shot and the scene from the movie are very similar.  

While I can find many references that have been made by Scorsese, nothing that has any validity until I found an article from the University of Pennsylvania library. The entry states “He also confirms the fact that Arthur Bremer and Dostoevsky’s Notes from Underground influenced Paul Schrader’s script.” (UPENN 2005) What might be the most interesting of all is that the Bremmer shooting Wallace inspired Taxi Driver, Taxi Driver inspired John Hinckley Jr. to shoot Ronald Reagan. What crazy world we live in.

Bibliography

UPENN. PENNTAGS tags/dreams?arthur+bremmer. october 11, 2005. tags.library.upenn.edu/tag/dreams/arthur+bremmer (accessed march 2005).

Our Nixon

This week we watched the Oliver Stone movie Born on the Fourth of July. To me this movie captures America through the eyes of Ron Kovic, a Vietnam vet who once would have done anything for his country but now back from the war feels differently and attempts to do his part to get America out of the war and Nixon out of office. The Oliver Stone movie from this era that I prefer is Nixon. While Born on the Fourth of July is very believable, Nixon is like Natural Born Killers meets JFK, going over the top in every category to make a point about how bad Nixon was. While researching the movie Nixon, I found out something rather interesting about Richard Nixon that I never knew.

We are all aware of Watergate and Nixon’s secret tapes but did you know that his top aides H.R. Haldeman, John Ehrlichman, and Dwight Chapin all videotaped events with small home movie cameras? The event has already expired but in October of last year, MoMA had a screening of the movie Our Nixon. The film is all of the archival footage put together to create a 90 minute video consisting of “Official banquets, parades, ceremonial balls, campaign rallies, and world-historic state visits “become mere episodes in one man’s life, rather than political events.” This special—dare we say, historic?—program includes a selection of raw camera rolls, several restored sequences (among them Nixon’s 1972 trip to China)” (Museum of Modern Art 2012)

I’m sure Our Nixon is nothing like Oliver Stone’s Nixon, but it would be interesting nonetheless. A man so disliked, even hated, during his time in office and nearly caused a revolution but to this day people find fascinating.

Bibliography

Museum of Modern Art. The White House Movies: Nixon on Super 8. October 2012. www.moma.org/visit/calendar/screening/16477 (accessed March 2013).

Our Nixon

Nixon