Mrs. Kennedy's Nightmare Laid Bare
There are a handful of images seared into the memory of anyone who’s learned about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy: A crowded plaza; a roofless presidential limousine; and a blood-stained pink Chanel suit. Director Pablo Larraín’s Jackie takes a deep, narrow dive into First Lady Jackie Kennedy’s (Natalie Portman) life in the days directly following her husband’s death, and creates a captivating, hypnotic portrait of a strong woman in her most trying moment.
Told with two framing devices—Jackie’s interview with Life magazine’s Theodore H. White, and a philosophical conversation she has with a priest (John Hurt)—the story jumps back and forth between these conversations, her period of mourning, and a handful of looks at her televised tour of the White House in 1962. Each is a different moment of claiming her own part of her husband’s story, and shaping what she thinks should be his legacy.
Larraín and cinematographer Stéphane Fontaine follow Portman and her scene partners like documentarians, creating the feel of a home movie. The film is just grainy and desaturated enough to replicate the aesthetic of the homemade films of the day, and it adds to the intimacy by cutting through the inherent glamor of a story told inside the Kennedy White House. Robust colors and a perfectly choreographed camera might have captured Jackie’s chaotic emotional state, but they wouldn’t have embodied it to the same degree. Composer Mica Levi's score delivers a heavy, lurching feel. It's the aural representation of one's stomach turning when tragedy strikes, and it perfectly sets the tone as we follow Jackie through four days of hell.
Although the camerawork and music of Jackie are crucial to its success, the film lives or dies by its lead performance, and Natalie Portman never once falters as the former First Lady. She fully inhabits this person who must find her way through unimaginable darkness. The horror of her husband's murder at her side; the pressure of planning his funeral as President Johnson waits for her to move out of the White House; the hints of cracking without ever actually shattering. Portman's Jackie is as strong as she is beautiful and poised; a public figure who had to guide a country through one of its darkest hours when she was experiencing something far more grim.
Those with clear memories of Jackie Kennedy’s particular accent and vocal affectations may find room for improvement with Portman’s rendition, but to a novice her voice was consistent throughout, and it matched the (admittedly shallow) experience I’ve had listening to the real Jackie speak. Peter Sarsgaard does a fine job as Robert F. Kennedy, never leaning into his accent hard enough for it to become parody—a wise choice when the Kennedy accent can easily become a caricature of itself—and he does an excellent job as the dutiful brother keeping less sensitive folks from getting to his grieving sister-in-law.
Jackie is all about how Mrs. Kennedy took the reins of her husband’s legacy. She didn’t want to be in such a position, but was nonetheless the only one who would push for grand arrangements. In a telling scene, Jackie and Bobby ride with Jack’s body from Air Force One to a hospital in Washington for the autopsy. Jackie asks a nurse if she knows who James Garfield was, eliciting a “no.” When Jackie asks driver who Abraham Lincoln was, he notes that the 16th President won the Civil War and freed the slaves. Both were assassinated while serving as President, and Jackie doesn’t want her husband to be another James Garfield. Through the birth of the Camelot myth, Jackie Kennedy ensured her husband’s legacy. Jackie gives the former First Lady her own proper legacy by revealing the nightmare she endured to make history. More than just a queen to her king, she shaped the lens through which we view her family’s story.