Thirteen Days (film) - Wikipedia. Thirteen Days is a 2.

American historicalpoliticalthriller film directed by Roger Donaldson, dramatizing the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1. US political leadership.

Kevin Costner stars as political consultant Kenneth P. O'Donnell, with Bruce Greenwood featured as President John F. Kennedy, Steven Culp as Attorney General. Robert F. Kennedy, and Dylan Baker as Secretary of Defense. Robert Mc. Namara. While the film carries the same title as the book Thirteen Days by former Attorney General Robert F.

Kennedy, it is in fact based on a different book, The Kennedy Tapes: Inside the White House During the Cuban Missile Crisis, by Ernest May and Philip Zelikow. It is the second docudrama made about the crisis, the first being 1. The Missiles of October, which was based on Kennedy's book. The 2. 00. 0 film contains some newly declassified information not available to the earlier production, but takes greater dramatic license, particularly in its choice of O'Donnell as protagonist.

In October 1. 96. U- 2 aerial surveillance photos reveal that the Soviet Union is in the process of placing intermediate- range ballistic missiles carrying nuclear weapons in Cuba. President John F.

Kennedy (Bruce Greenwood) and his advisers must come up with a plan of action to prevent their activation. Kennedy is determined to show that the United States will not allow a missile threat. The Joint Chiefs of Staff advise immediate U.

’Thirteen Days’ Doesn’t Add Up by Michael Nelson, Political Science Professor, Rhodes College. The film Thirteen Days, a Hollywood account of the Cuban Missile. We wanted the audience to watch the. When I learned that Thirteen Days. these discrepancies are simply the result of squeezing into a two-hour film a 13-day.

IMDb, the world's most popular and authoritative source for movie, TV and celebrity content. Thirteen Days (2000) on IMDb: Plot summary, synopsis, and more. Watch Now or On TV From $2.99 (SD). Amazon Video Rent from $2.99. On TV. Airs Mon. Nov. 06, 5:30 PM on TNT (051) 3 Days to Kill. PG-13.

S. military strikes against the missile sites followed by an invasion of Cuba. However, Kennedy is reluctant to attack and invade because it would very likely cause the Soviets to invade Berlin, which could lead to an all- out war.

Citing The Guns of August, Kennedy sees an analogy to the events that started World War I, where the tactics of both sides' commanders had not evolved since the previous war and were obsolete, only this time nuclear weapons are involved. War appears to be almost inevitable.

Thirteen The Movie

The Kennedy administration tries to find a solution that will remove the missiles but avoid an act of war. They settle on a step less than a blockade, which is formally regarded as an act of war. They settle on what they publicly describe as a quarantine. They announce that the U. S. naval forces will stop all ships entering Cuban waters and inspect them to verify they are not carrying weapons destined for Cuba. The Soviet Union sends mixed messages in response.

Off the shores of Cuba, the Soviet ships turn back from the quarantine lines. Secretary of State.

Dean Rusk (Henry Strozier) says, "We're eyeball to eyeball and I think the other fellow just blinked." The administration continues to order spy plane pictures, but one of Kennedy's advisers, Kenny O'Donnell (Kevin Costner), calls the pilots to ensure the pilots do not report that they were shot at or fired upon, because if they were, the country would be forced to retaliate under the rules of engagement. John A. Scali, a reporter with ABC News, is contacted by Soviet "emissary" Aleksandr Fomin (Boris Lee Krutonog), and through this back- channel communication method the Soviets offer to remove the missiles in exchange for public assurances from the U. S. that it will never invade Cuba. A long message in the same tone as the informal communication from Fomin, apparently written personally by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, is received. This is followed by a second, more hard line cable in which the Soviets offer a deal involving U. S removal of its Jupiter missiles from Turkey.

The Kennedy administration interprets the second as a response from the Politburo, and in a risky act, decides to ignore it and respond to the first message, assumed to be from Khrushchev. There are several mis- steps during the crisis: the defense readiness level of Strategic Air Command (SAC) is raised to DEFCON 2 (one step shy of maximum readiness for imminent war), without informing the President; a nuclear weapon test proceeds (Bluegill Triple Prime) and a routine test launch of a U.

S. offensive missile is also carried out without the President's knowledge. In a bid for time while under intense pressure from the military for an immediate strike, President Kennedy authorizes attacks on the missile sites and an invasion of Cuba, to commence the following Monday. An Air Force U- 2 reconnaissance plane is sent over Cuba to gather intelligence for the attack, but is shot down, killing the pilot. After much deliberation with the Executive Committee of the National Security Council, Kennedy makes a final attempt to avoid a war by sending his brother, Robert F.

Kennedy (Steven Culp), to meet with Soviet ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin on Friday night. Bobby reiterates the demand that the Soviets remove their missiles from Cuba, and in return promises not to invade or assist in the invasion of Cuba. Dobrynin insists that the U. S. must also remove all Jupiter missiles from Turkey, on the border of the Soviet Union. Bobby says that a quid pro quo is not possible, but in exchange for Khrushchev removing all the missiles from Cuba, there will be a secret understanding that the U.

S. will remove all of its "obsolete" missiles from Turkey within six months as part of a pre- scheduled plan. The Soviets announce on Sunday that they will remove their missiles from Cuba, averting a war that could have escalated to the use of nuclear weapons. The film ends with President Kennedy dictating a letter of condolence to the family of the reconnaissance pilot, Rudolf Anderson, who was shot down over Cuba as part of the preparations for the invasion, and the Kennedy brothers and O'Donnell outside of the Oval Office as actual audio of President Kennedy's commencement speech at American University played in the background. Bruce Greenwood as President.

John F. Kennedy. Steven Culp as Attorney General. Robert F. Kennedy. Stephanie Romanov as First Lady. Jacqueline Kennedy. Digimon Adventure 01 Episode 38 on this page. Kevin Costner as Special Assistant to the President.

Kenneth O'Donnell. Dylan Baker as Secretary of Defense. Robert Mc. Namara. Michael Fairman as United States Ambassador to the United Nations.

Adlai Stevenson IIDaniel Vergara as Secretary General of the Organization of American States. José Antonio Mora. Bill Smitrovich as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. General. Maxwell Taylor, USAJack Blessing as ABC News correspondent John A. Scali. Frank Wood as National Security Advisor.

Mc. George Bundy. Ed Lauter as Deputy Director of the CIALieutenant General. Marshall Carter, USAMadison Mason as Chief of Naval Operations. Admiral. George Whelan Anderson Jr. Kevin Conway as Chief of Staff of the USAFGeneral. Curtis Le. May, USAFPramod Kumar as United Nations Secretary General. U Thant. Tim Kelleher as White House Counsel.

Ted Sorensen. Len Cariou as Former Secretary of State. Dean Acheson. Chip Esten as U- 2 pilot Major. Rudolf Anderson, USAFOlek Krupa as Soviet Foreign Minister. Andrei Gromyko. Lucinda Jenney as Helen O'Donnell, wife to Kenneth O'Donnell. Jack Mc. Gee as Richard J. Daley, Mayor of Chicago. Janet Coleman as Evelyn Lincoln President Kennedy's Secretary.

Tom Everett as Walter Sheridan Special assistant to President Kennedy. Oleg Vidov as Valerian Zorin, Soviet Ambassador to the United Nations. John Aylward as Orvil Dryfoos publisher of The New York Times.

Elya Baskin as Anatoly Dobrynin. Ambassador of the Soviet Union to the United States. Larry Strauss as Treasury Secretary. Douglas Dillon. Alex Veadov as Radio Room Operator #3. Henry Strozier as Secretary of State. Dean Rusk. Walter Adrian as Vice President. Lyndon B. Johnson.

Christopher Lawford as RF- 8 Crusader pilot, Commander. William Ecker, USN.

Kelly Connell as Press Secretary. Pierre Salinger. Peter White as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. John Mc. Cone. Boris Lee Krutonog as Alexander Feklisov (a. Alexander Fomin), KGB spy.

Dakin Matthews as Arthur C. Lundahl. James Karen as George Ball. Dan Ziskie as General Commander of the Tactical Air Command. Walter 'Cam' Sweeney (USAF)Marya Kazakova as Soviet Woman.

Thirteen Days' Doesn't Add Upby Michael Nelson, Political Science Professor, Rhodes College. The film Thirteen Days, a Hollywood account of the Cuban Missile Crisis, purports to take audiences “behind the scenes” at the White House during the tense and critical period when nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union seemed not only possible but likely. Watch Bo Burnham: Make Happy Online Free 2016 there.

Feature films, television shows, and novels that fictionalize the past invariably include dramatic embellishments and fictitious encounters, and they have a powerful impact on how students understand history. Michael Nelson, professor of political science at Rhodes College, analyzes Thirteen Days and other fictional treatments of the presidency (notably the television series The West Wing) and explores strategies for teaching students about the complexities of power and politics beyond the movie theater. Posted February 2. One of the most jarring things I discovered when I taught my first undergraduate course on the American presidency in the fall of 1. Cuban missile crisis.

I was 1. 3. They didn’t remember a thing about those storied 1. October 1. 96. 2. I remembered everything, including what it was like to go to school in the morning in fear that I would not come home that afternoon.

Students today barely recall the cold war (they were around 1. Berlin Wall fell), and the Cuban missile crisis may as well have happened in 1. So after reading one stellar review after another in the national media, I took my current class on the presidency to see Thirteen Days, the new $8. Kevin Costner, on the weekend it opened. It turned out to be a disappointing movie, except for actor Bruce Greenwood’s wonderfully nuanced portrayal of John F. Kennedy as — at least for the duration of the crisis — a thoughtful, anguished, morally serious president who remained cool under pressure. Despite its flaws, however, I’m still glad I took my students to see it.

The inclination in most college social- science courses is to show movies sparingly, if at all, and to show only classics. I’m not sure what those would be in a course on the presidency: As critic Terrence Rafferty has noted, “It’s difficult to name a profession that has inspired fewer great movies. Maybe urology.”) But the impressions of a historical or political subject that students bring with them into a course are often derived from the popular entertainment of their day.

Going as a class to see a movie that most of my students would have gone to see anyway created an opportunity to help them sort out the historical wheat from the Hollywood chaff. For that reason, I still kick myself for not having taken them to see JFK, Oliver Stone’s cinematically powerful but historically awful movie about the Kennedy assassination. Thirteen Days unfolds from the perspective of Kenneth O’Donnell, who is played by Costner.

In real life, O’Donnell was a political consigliere to the Kennedy brothers. Robert F. Kennedy, a friend and classmate of O’Donnell’s at Harvard, had first brought him into his brother John’s campaign organization when John ran for the Senate in 1. No one has ever argued that O’Donnell, who served as White House appointments secretary and political adviser after Kennedy became president in 1. To the contrary, a host of historians, political scientists, journalists, and Kennedy aides — including Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Graham Allison, Marvin Kalb, and Theodore Sorensen — have said that O’Donnell (as Schlesinger put it) “had nothing to do with the Cuban missile crisis.” Ernest R. May, coeditor of The Kennedy Tapes (the book on which the movie is based), said in The American Prospect that the apparent rationale for making O’Donnell the main character in Thirteen Days was that he could serve as an“inside Everyman, evaluating the crisis almost as an ordinary citizen would.” Ironically, the Everyman device works best when O’Donnell goes outside among all the other Everyfolk, walking the streets of Washington and joining a long line of people entering a Catholic church with a handwritten signboard out front advertising “Confessions 2. Pray for Peace.” When the O’Donnell character is inside the White House, he is at center stage, not watching from a corner.

To a one, my students left the theater convinced that O’Donnell had been a more important figure in the crisis than Attorney General Robert Kennedy or any other member of Ex Comm, the ad hoc group of current and former executivebranch officials that President Kennedy created to respond to the Soviet Union’s covert installation of offensive nuclear missiles in Cuba. In one entirely fictitious scene, O’Donnell phones the Navy pilot who is about to fly a low- altitude surveillance mission over Cuba and tells him to lie to his superior officers if Cuban or Russian soldiers try to shoot him down. O’Donnell would rather conceal evidence than allow it to be used by advocates of a military strike. In another scene, O’Donnell calls Adlai Stevenson to stiffen the U. N. ambassador’s spine before Stevenson presses the American case against the Soviet Union in the Security Council. Stevenson’s spine needed — and received — no such stiffening from O’Donnell or anyone else on that occasion.

Yet stiffening spines is one of O’Donnell’s main functions in Thirteen Days. You come away thinking that President Kennedy could never have made his televised speech to the nation and Robert Kennedy would have flubbed his presentation of the administration’s crisis- ending compromise to the Soviet ambassador, Anatoly Dobrynin, if O’Donnell hadn’t pulled them aside for pep talks. Bizarrely, a scene that replicates the famous from- behind photograph of Kennedy leaning heavily on a table ends with O’Donnell handing him a drink. Inflating O’Donnell’s importance in the missile crisis, however, is not the main problem with Thirteen Days. No one ever complains that Ishmael’s role in the story of Captain Ahab’s hunt for the white whale is inflated just because Ishmael is the narrator. From a historical perspective, the film’s main problems are that it inflates the role of White House political- staff members and portrays the military brass as cartoonish hawks. I call the first phenomenon the West Wing syndrome, which is already widespread, especially among political- science students.

Like Thirteen Days, the West Wing television series is not bereft of virtue, especially its seriousness of purpose about the dilemmas of governing. But the series is notorious for, among other things, attributing nearly all that’s good in government to the (mostly young and attractive) political advisers on the White House staff. West Wing’s vice president is a bad guy. Its members of Congress are cravenly self- interested.

Most of its cabinet officers are parochial, peripheral, and second- rate. Within the TV White House, staff members whose expertise is more in public policy than in politics — the national security adviser, domestic policy adviser, and chief economic adviser — are seldom, if ever, seen.

When good things happen to America on The West Wing, it’s because President Josiah Bartlet and his political advisers have taken charge. The West Wing syndrome is on full display in Thirteen Days.

Mc. George Bundy, the national security adviser, comes across as clownishly inept (he wasn’t — not even close). Secretary of Defense Robert Mc.

Namara is portrayed with little of his real- life intelligence and force of personality. And Congress is represented only by the sound of braying voices in a meeting room from which President Kennedy is indignantly stalking (that never happened). Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson, whom May and his coeditor, Philip D.

Zelikow, describe in The Kennedy Tapes as having skillfully chaired several Ex Comm meetings in the president’s absence, is neither seen nor heard during the crisis — his main presence in the movie is as the butt of a joke between the president and O’Donnell.