High Hopes 1960
March 19, 2008
Robert Drew's documentary Primary takes us back to the Wisconsin Democratic primary of 1960. The two candidates are John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey. It is strange to watch Kennedy flickering on a television set before it was clear he would win the 1960 election.. let alone before his face became an iconic image. Remarkably, his words and image will be appropriated and hotly claimed a full 48 years later.
The documentary expends little energy in explaining the political context. I had various questions about the candidates and how this primary fit into the wider story of the campaign, but I got little help. The interest was not exposition but immediate experience: what was the process of running for president like as it unfolds in a state like Wisconsin? Viewers get a feeling for the everyday-ness of the political process.
In the above photo we see Kennedy in the midst of a crush of autograph seekers. In another scene we are shown some young girls racing down the street. Kennedy has the excitement while Hubert Humphrey addresses solid farmers and small towners. You might even start to compare Kennedy to a rock star.. and that might end up making you think of a very similar documentary: Don't Look Back, a documentary that followed Bob Dylan around without comment in 1965. D.A. Pennebaker, maker of Don't Look Back, was a photographer for Primary.. so that connection would not be just in your imagination.
It occurred to me while watching Primary that it can be watched with some quite different perspectives. There is the political and cultural history that is present throughout. There are also the glimpses of small town Wisconsin seen through the windows of campaign cars and busses. The trees are bare and the houses white and small. The roads are modest and windy—no big highways out there it seems. Mainstreet store fronts are not filled with instantly recognizable corporate brands. I would argue that in the long long run these images of Wisconsin that fill the screen for a few seconds as the camera pans are as valuable as anything else. It is too bad we did not have more cameras just walking down mainstreet and getting people to talk.
An image like this one above spurs me to try harder to record the world around me. It helps if you have John F. Kennedy in your camera viewfinder.. but I'll get along without a celebrity. That will be the point of the next season of Wisconsin Views.
By the way, Primary featured the Kennedy theme song which went to the tune of "High Hopes". I found on YouTube a video of someone playing an original 45 of this tune with the lyrics in support of Kennedy. It is sung by Frank Sinatra!
