STORY BEHIND THE MOVIE

I’M a lifelong Clint Eastwood fan but there are a few gaps in my my knowledge. Can you tell me much about In The Line Of Fire? – S.

As a child, Jeff Apple got to meet then-US vice-president Lyndon B. Johnson.

He recalled being surrounded by scores of intimidating-looking agents.

The encounter stayed with him.

So, too, did grainy footage of the Kennedy assassination.

So it was no surprise that, when his career took him to Hollywood, the idea of a film about a veteran agent entrusted with protecting the President at all costs became his pet production project.

Eastwood’s character was inspired by Clint Hill, an agent who was in the motorcade with JFK.

Images of Eastwood from his early movies were weaved into footage of the Kennedy assassination – the flashback scenes giving the Dirty Harry actor, in Apple’s words, a “digital haircut”.