1954-ті жылғы Армия-Маккарти тыңдауы: Шындықтың ашылуы

1963 film by Emile de Antonio

Point of Order! is a 1963 American documentary film by Emile de Antonio about the Senate Army–McCarthy hearings of 1954.

The Army–McCarthy hearings came about when the Army accused Senator Joseph McCarthy of improperly pressuring the Army for special privileges for Private G. David Schine, formerly of McCarthy's investigative staff. McCarthy counter charged that the Army was holding Schine hostage to keep him from searching for Communists in the Army. The hearings were broadcast live on television in their entirety and also recorded via kinescope. This film was created from those kinescope recordings.

The film uses selections from the hearings to show the overall development of the trial, beginning with introductions from several main participants, such as Joseph N. Welch and McCarthy. Each participant is shown in a still image with a brief audio recording, except for McCarthy, who is introduced with longer footage of a speech he made during the hearings. The film ends with a heated exchange between Symington and McCarthy that occurred when the hearings were about to adjourn for the day. Symington sharply questions the handling of McCarthy's secret files by his staff. McCarthy calls this a "smear" against the men on his staff; and, as Symington starts to leave, McCarthy accuses him of using "the same tactics that the Communist Party has used for too long." Symington returns to the microphone and says: "Apparently every time anybody says anything against anybody working for Senator McCarthy, he is declaring them and accusing them of being Communists!" Symington leaves and the hearings adjourn. McCarthy continues his passionate but repetitious defense of his staff and his attack on Symington, speaking to an increasingly empty chamber. The actual end to the hearings, in which McCarthy was cleared of any wrongdoing, does not appear in the film. Talbot initially asked Orson Welles, then Irving Lerner to direct the film, but neither man agreed to do so. Talbot hired Paul Falkenberg to edit the film, and Falkenberg asked Richard Rovere to write narration for the film, to be read by Mike Wallace. However, when Falkenberg screened a rough cut of the film for the producers, they did not approve and decided to start over. De Antonio offered to direct the film for free, which Talbot accepted. De Antonio hired a young editor named Robert Duncan to help edit the film. Their plan was to remove any narration, music, or added scenes and create a documentary using only the footage from the kinescopes of the hearings. This approach to filmmaking—which de Antonio would use on later films—was similar to the use of assemblage in the works of modern artists like Robert Rauschenberg, who was a friend of de Antonio.

The film premiered in New York City in conjunction with the first New York Film Festival at the Museum of Modern Art in September 1963. It was released in New York on January 14, 1964. It was distributed by Continental Distributing in 103 theaters nationwide. In 1968 it was recut and shown on television, with an added introduction by Paul Newman, to provide context for audiences unfamiliar with the Army–McCarthy hearings. In 1986, MPI Home Video released an abridged 49 minute version (with the Newman Introduction) under the title McCarthy, Death of a Witch Hunter: a Film of the Era of Senator Joseph R. McCarthy. Point of Order! was released on DVD by New Yorker Films in 2005, in its original 97 minute cut.

The Museum of Modern Art suggested that Point of Order may not be strictly defined as a film. Critical reception to the film was largely positive. Among its proponents were Dwight Macdonald, Susan Sontag, Brendan Gill, and Stanley Kaufmann. Even Roy Cohn wrote about the film's historical significance, despite disagreement over the film's portrayals of him and Senator McCarthy.

In 1964, W. W. Norton & Company published the book Point of Order! A Documentary of the Army–McCarthy Hearings, in book form. The 108 page book featured still photos captured from the kinescopes of CBS. David T. Bazelon wrote the introduction and epilogue.

In 1993, this film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".