The Man Who Might Have Been: An Inquiry Into the Life and Death of Herbert Norman (1999)
19 Jan 1999 1h 38m
On April 4, 1957, Herbert Norman, the Canadian ambassador to Egypt, leapt to his death from a Cairo rooftop. During his remarkable life, Norman helped set the course of post-war Japan and played a key role during the Suez crisis. But with all of his talents and achievements, there was something haunting Herbert Norman and following him to every corner of the globe: the accusation that he was a Soviet spy. This documentary takes us back to a time when the Cold War was heating up and when the mere accusation of communist sympathies could destroy a man's career. Using de-classified documents, interviews with key players and dramatizations filmed around the world, the film reconstructs the ordeal that Norman endured for seven long years, as a US Senate subcommittee relentlessly probed his past beliefs and current loyalties. During his meteoric rise and fall, Norman crossed paths with some of the greatest personalities of his time: Nobel-prize winning Canadian diplomat and politician Lester B. Pearson; FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, whose organization had an 800-page security file on Norman; General Douglas MacArthur, to whom Norman was a trusted aide; and charismatic Egyptian leader Gamel Abdul Nasser.
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English
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Canada
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