Lindbergh
What most remember but few fully
appreciate is this: he was the first man to fly from New York
to Paris, and he did it alone, without a radio, sextant, or
parachute, in a single-engine plane with a top speed of only
119 miles per hour. His Spirit of St. Louis covered 3,610
miles in 33 hours and 30 minutes. He was only 25 years old,
and the historic date was May 21, 1927.
What has been forgotten, if it
was ever understood at all, is that Charles Lindbergh did
more than just cover great distances in the air, he also journeyed
through a time of change like no other. Born before the Wright
brothers first flight, Lindbergh died  having
witnessed man's conquest of the moon. The events that made
Charles Lindbergh an American hero -- his epic flight, the
tragedy of his son's kidnapping and murder, his flirtation
with Nazism on the eve of World War II – are essential
to his story. But beyond the myth, beyond the Lindbergh etched
on our memory from heroic photographs or shaky frames of newsreel
film, there lies an even more complex and dynamic individual.
Lindbergh's life teems with contrasts
and contradictions. He was a public man who struggled all
his life to protect his own identity from a hero-worshipping
society. He hated the press, yet spent most of his life attracting
publicity. He avoided power, yet used his fame to try and
influence world events. He valued accuracy and a sense of
perspective, yet his own perspective was often flawed and
frightening. He was cold and self-righteous, with social and
political views that were narrow and naive. He perceived the
strengths and weaknesses of individuals or nations in starkly
scientific terms, espousing a faith in genetic determinism
that hid a thinly veiled racism. He lived a life of absolutes,
never doubting his own abilities or the altitude of his own
moral high ground. His extraordinary character brought him
unparalleled accomplishment but also public humiliation and
lonely isolation.
Few men in this century have ever
captured the hearts and minds of a nation as Charles Lindbergh
did in 1927, and it is in the consequences of his fame, for
the man and for his nation, that the true meaning of Lindbergh's
life lies. Lindbergh, Stephen Ives’ debut film
for the PBS series American Experience, faithfully
traces the chronology of Lindbergh's life and explores the
fabric of the society which so euphorically embraced him and
then bitterly cast him aside. Bringing together for the first
time interviews with Charles Lindbergh's wife, Anne Morrow
Lindbergh, youngest daughter, Reeve and eldest son, Jon, the
film creates a powerful and emotional family portrait that
penetrates beneath the stereotypes and misconceptions about
Lindbergh's life, and presents a revealing portrait of Lindbergh
not as an icon, but as a man with both extraordinary human
strengths and all-too-familiar human weaknesses.
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