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Wednesday, Mar 11, 1987
My Son John
A haunting Cold War melodrama with Helen Hayes and Robert Walker. John is the pink sheep of the family; a college graduate and government diplomat, he is suspected by both the FBI and his own parents of being a Communist agent. The incriminating evidence is his love for humanity, which he pompously professes; his preference for the intellectual life over football; and most importantly, his adoration of his professors over Dad (Dean Jagger), an American Legion fanatic who literally beats him over the head with the Bible. The film, which presumably sets out to show how Communism worms its way into the American family, instead demonstrates how witch-hunting as a national pastime enters the home, feeding family claustrophobia with paranoia.
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