Inspired by a podcast about Julius Caesar, Dara realises he has long had a fascination with assassinations, particularly those that have played out in movies. In this episode he looks closely at the celluloid executions that most impacted him, paying close attention to Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde and Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather, amongst others.
Warming to the theme, he considers Mark David Chapman and John Hinckley Jr. and their attachment to the works of art that spurred their actions. Dara sees a connection between a very American relationship to fame and public image and how that can bleed into a wilful embrace of notoriety.
Staying in the US, the four seismic assassinations in the 60s of JFK (1963), Malcolm X (1965), Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy (both1968) raise the question of the primacy of the gun in the US psyche and whether the driving energy of American confidence and conquest is essentially phallic.
In conclusion Dara wonders if a wellness analogy can be extrapolated from the idea of assassination and he comes up with mixed results!
The Rest is History podcast Julius Caesar episode – https://shows.acast.com/the-rest-is-history-podcast/episodes/304-the-murder-of-julius-caesar
Assassination at the Movies, excellent 2012 Guardian article – https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/oct/04/assassination-movies-michael-newton