Screenworks (Apr 2018)
Anatomy of a Murder – Sirhan Sirhan and Robert Kennedy
Abstract
Shane O’Sullivan’s Anatomy of a Murder – Sirhan Sirhan and Robert Kennedy is a video essay that combines archival material, interview, witness statements and parole hearing recordings relating to the case of Sirhan Sirhan, the person found guilty of assassinating Senator Robert Kennedy in 1968, intercut with footage from trials in well-known Hollywood films. It is a controversial video and, as such, has elicited divergent peer reviews, particularly with regard to its ambiguous position both as an academic research film and polemical campaign video. We therefore publish this partly because of its strengths but also to highlight problems and questions it might raise relating to the place of polemical campaign videos in the context of academic filmmaking – as a contribution to the ongoing dialogue about what constitutes screen media practice research
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