Oscar Winner Plans Abu Ghraib Photo Site
Since Abu Ghraib first came to the world’s attention in 2004, nearly 300 photographs of Iraqi prisoner abuse have been shown to the public. But soon an enormous archive of new material - including more than 1,500 other photos, unredacted court papers and interview transcripts - will be posted online by filmmaker Errol Morris, whose latest documentary “S.O.P.: Standard Operating Procedure” examines the scandal in horrific detail.
“I’d like all this material to be seen,” says Morris, who shot an estimated 200 hours of interviews for his two-hour film and used much of the extra material as research for an accompanying book scheduled for release later this year. The Academy Award-winning filmmaker (for “The Fog of War”) says he’s currently negotiating with several universities to host the large collection.
Using the current promotional site for his new movie to spark the larger project he envisions, Morris plans to create an interface in which clicking on each photo pulls up its context and circumstances - who took it, who else was present when was it shot and any salient testimony made to the commissions investigating Abu Ghraib. Morris sees his website as a growing historical archive, with new information added as more participants and witnesses come forward to speak.
Morris’ new film was publicly unveiled last month at the prestigious Berlin International Film Festival, where it became the first documentary to ever be nominated for the top award. (It ended up winning a jury grand prize instead.) Opening in several U.S. cities on April 25, the film will roll out to more theaters in May. Raw, brutal and unrelenting, it is also a vivid tone poem recounting the stories behind the well-known photographs and an attempt to uncover the truth of what happened outside the frame.
“We think somehow we know what Abu Ghraib is about because we’ve seen the photographs,” says Morris, “and I believe the photographs do not really tell us the real story. The photographs are both cover-up and exposé. The element of the cover-up is unknown, I suppose because it was covered up. It’s as simple as that. … I don’t think there ever will be justice until parts of the story are made public, and I am trying very hard to do that.”
Morris says few, if any, members of the public are aware, for example, that children were kept at the prison as hostages, ostensibly in order to make family members talk.
Morris also feels the popular perception of Abu Ghraib has been colored by both political agendas. “The left and the right - and I don’t think it makes much difference here - all assume they know what’s in the photographs,” he says. “In that sense, it goes beyond politics. Yes, the left will say it’s because of this administration’s policies, while the right will say it’s a few bad apples. But both [sides] stop at the photographs, because there’s a feeling we know what they mean and what they’re about. … I don’t think it’s been known at all.”
Whether they be big-budget narratives featuring major stars or low-budget documentaries, recent films about the Middle East have had a rough time at the box office.
“No End in Sight,” exploring the neo-conservative’s rationale for invading Iraq and the problems leading to the violent insurgency, became 2007’s second most successful documentary - and earned a miniscule $1.4 million. “Taxi to the Dark Side,” detailing the death of an Afghan taxi driver while he was being interrogated by U.S. soldiers, won the Oscar for best documentary in February, yet it has grossed less than $200,000.
But Morris has never chased commercial success. His films are meditations on the human condition, asking deep, probing questions that often don’t have simple answers. He realizes Abu Ghraib is something most Americans would rather forget than spend $10 to relive on a Saturday night. But he can’t shake the disturbing, nagging notion that the scandal will continue to haunt the nation until and unless it comes to terms with what actually happened.
Congress, under Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), has investigated the prisoner abuse scandal, but Morris thinks there is still more to the story.
“I have a feeling that everybody has kept hands-off of this because it’s seen as a political hot potato that perhaps doesn’t help anybody,” says Morris. “But Abu Ghraib goes well beyond the issue of torture - it’s about the abandonment of our military and the scapegoating of low-ranked soldiers. It’s that version of ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ where Mr. Potter wins and the little guys are blamed while the big guys walk away scot-free. It happened in My Lai too. Maybe there’s just some fear of proceeding further but, oddly enough, this stuff doesn’t go away. My Lai is still with us; so is the Dreyfus Affair.”
Besides the premiere of his new movie, the upcoming book and the accompanying website, Morris is keeping busy with plans for new films, an ongoing series of articles for The New York Times, as well as other projects.
During the last presidential election cycle, he made several commercials for MoveOn.org, and this year he may again helm some ads for one of the so-called 527 groups. It’s not something he’s entirely thrilled about, however. “I dread politics, I have to tell you,” he confesses. “It’s wandering into the true morass, the swamp. But I’d be happy to do it again.”
ODDS & ENDS:
With any new president comes a flood of new political appointments, so this week The Hollywood Reporter canvassed the “tele-cognescenti” to predict who could be selected as the next Federal Communications Commission chair under different administrations. Should Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton become the first woman commander in chief, pundits claimed FCC Commissioner Susan Ness might also become the first female chief.
Under a President Obama, the trade paper suggested Harvard Law School pal Julius Genachowski, former FCC Common Carrier Bureau chief Larry Stickling, policy director Karen Kornbluh or Commission vet Don Gipps. Sen. John McCain, who headed the Senate committee charged with oversight of the FCC, might select Disney lobbyist Bill Bailey, Google counsel Pablo Chavez or top adviser Charlie Black.
Candidates can’t stay away from Hollywood - or Hollywood cash. Clinton will return to Beverly Hills on April 3 for a fundraiser that’s billed as “an evening of live conversation and celebration” at the Wilshire Theater. Tickets start at $100 and go up to, yes, $2,300 - the limit for donors under federal campaign laws. McCain is also in the Los Angeles area this week, for a speech before the Los Angeles World Affairs Council.
© 2008 Politico.com
“…Taxi to the Dark Side,” detailing the death of an Afghan taxi driver while he was being interrogated by U.S. soldiers, won the Oscar for best documentary in February, yet it has grossed less than $200,000….”
Since average Americans suffer with amnesia, distractive dissociation [eg American idol], ignorance or are simply asleep….Pity, these are the most disturbing times in American History…
The only way we are going to get any real news is thru these kinds of documentaries. Morris or Michael Moore need to do one on “The Oil of Iraq.”
Simonhhh, “Taxi to the Dark Side” – I’ve heard it is a good movie. Some of my friends have seen it. It is making the rounds, around the world. But don’t expect it to outdraw “spiderman IIX”. Suffice it to say that whether it is shown in the US or not, what Americans are doing is not going unnoticed.
It’s the market - how many theaters has TttDS been in? None in my neck of the woods. You can’t compare gross without comparing markets. We can go to three different theaters to see the grossest crap ever made but we will never get this film or Body of War or any of the good films.
The anti-war anti-torture films gross a lot more outside the US than inside the US, yet the corporations watch the gross numbers to gage the apathy of the American people. If the corporations find Americans remain apathetic they will continue to order the White House and Republican Congress to continue the occupations. If they find the people are getting fed up or worse, a moral conscious, they will order the government to end the occupation before revolution. Since America is a democracy and is governed, legally speaking, by the people, the corporations are off the hook morally, since all the torture and concentration camps like Abu Graib are ultimately the responsibility of the people, we did vote for Bush and Cheney twice, didn’t we? and even if the elections were rigged a little , too few people protested to undo the crooked elections, so defacto the people are responsible morally for the torture murders bombs war crimes etc , even though the corporations like Exxon, Boeing and Blackwater reap the profits of our moral weakness.
Just please be sure to write into the account the story of Alyssa Peterson, who took her own life to express her feelings about being in the position of interogater. Her life and sacrifice merit a great deal more than passing sympathy. She was passionate about all she did. She had a gift for languages, and patriotically took on arabic to help the nation she believed in. Upon experiencing the reality we were given a glance at via Abu Gahraib, she complained and was assigned to guard duty. She died of a non-combat gun shot all alone in the dark of her little shack. And what did Jerry Wright say for us about that sort of thing? Well more particulars need be presented. Her family is said to want privacy in the matter, but her story is more important than to be silenced utterly by that desire. Surely it can be accomplished without OJ type fanfare, and with sufficient respect to describe the sense of honor which should exist. Betrayal is what silence about this incident means.
I have heard that even when the TTTDS movie drew large crowds during its run, the run was only allowed inexplicably for a week or so.
Hmmmm = has film distribution gone the way MSM?
On January 5, 2006, during my second of five trips to Israel Palestine since June 2005, I traveled to Ramallah and to the Headquarters of ADAMEER [Arabic for conscience] to meet with spokesperson Ala Jaradat.
Some of what he informed me of:
“The methods and photos from Abu Grahib and Guantanamo were no shock to any Palestinian who had been in prison between 1967 and the ‘80’s. All the methods used in Abu Grahib were normal procedures against Palestinians.
“In 1999 Internationals, Palestinians and Israelis for human rights threatened a boycott against Israel and that is what forced the Supreme Court to address the torture issue. They did not ban torture and the General Prosecutor can choose not to prosecute those who still use it.”
Eileen Fleming,
Reporter and Editor WAWA:
http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Author “Keep Hope Alive” and “Memoirs of a Nice Irish American ‘Girl’s’ Life in Occupied Territory”
Producer “30 Minutes With Vanunu” and “13 Minutes with Vanunu”
…and what about “Rendition”? A wonderful movie which, had it been about something less controversial, would surely have netted Reese Witherspoon best-actress and Meryl Streep best-supporting-actress nominations. Tom Cruise, as a Bobby Kennedy-like senator, gives the best performance of his career (equal to “Magnolia”).
Tsk, tsk… sank without a ripple!
Sicko was in one theatre in my area for a very, very short time shortly after it came out. I missed seeing it and kept looking for it. I live in an area where there are several large cities and probably as many as 50 movie theatres, but it was never shown again. Finally, someone gave me a Sicko DVD as a present.
People in the US who support this war, and would consider voting for John McCain, should be ashamed of themselves. They ought to be ashamed to show their faces.
This war has been both-a humanitarian and a strategic disaster-from beginning to end; it has brought nothing but pain and suffering to all concerned. It endangers everyone.
Places like Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, Bagram Airforce Base, are an absolute disgrace to all concerned. What kind of sick, twisted, mentality supports travesties like this?
Anyone who supports torture and abuse is one sick puppy.
People like this hate America, they hate freedom, they hate eveything good, decent, and humane. They have done more to destroy America, than any terrorist ever could.
If they had any common decency they’d pack and go-or at least keep their big mouths shut. That alone would be a real plus.
We should start calling these war whores by their actual name-they are traitors. They are absolute and utter traitors. Time to use the word.
I think there is an even deeper( and more pernicious) issue here. Our psychic defense mechanisms don’t allow us to see the ugly truths about our own characters. The other is always the “bad guy” even when we engage in equally reprehensible behavior. The long-term solution has to involve raising up individual human consciousness. Just to assign labels symbolizing relative degrees of evil to different players in the human drama won’t create a more humane world—it just switches who is wearing the white hats .vs. the black hats—the tedious transformations of history. Filmmakers like Errol Morris are treasures because raising consciousness is exactly what they do by not letting us treat these subjects cursorially or reductively— by reminding us that we don’t already know what we claim to know. As an aside, I loved that film about the man who designed execution devices, and the one about the dubious murderer in Texas. Extraordinary documentaries. Films I will continue to think about for a long time.
On the topic of prison life in Abu Ghraib - here is the latest on Omar Khadr in Guantanamo Bay. It must be demoralizing when those you thought had come to save you are in bed with those who have devoted themselves to hurting you. I am sure that there will be questions about this new information during Question Period on Monday:
SCC reserves decision on Omar Khadr case
Canada’s top court will wait until a later date to rule on the Omar Khadr case. It reserved judgment on the former child soldier’s case after hearing arguments Wednesday from his lawyers and the federal government.
Justice Department lawyers went before the court, arguing for a reversal of a lower court decision that would see Ottawa forced to disclose confidential documents relating to Khadr’s case. …
Edney said 99 per cent of the documents his team has received from the Canadian government have been blacked out.
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080326/khadr_SCC_080326/20080326?hub=Canada
Top court reserves judgment on release of Khadr transcripts
Canada ‘took advantage’ of Khadr at Guantanamo Bay, lawyer says
Khadr’s lawyers argued he’s entitled to the material because Canadian officials violated the Charter of Rights when they interviewed him at Guantanamo. They also hope the transcripts will provide evidence that Ottawa knew a Canadian citizen was being tortured and did nothing about it.
“We’re saying that Canada has an obligation to provide those documents, and that obligation arises because it went to Guantanamo Bay when it was well known that this is a place beyond the rule of law. It took advantage of Omar Khadr,” Edney said. …
In an affidavit filed with a U.S. military court, Khadr alleges U.S. military interrogators in Afghanistan threatened him with rape and treated him harshly, forcing him to make false and self-incriminating statements.
He also claims that Canadian diplomats and intelligence officers who later questioned him at Guantanamo refused to help him.
Instead, he says in the affidavit, they questioned him about his late father, Ahmed Said Khadr, who’s been accused of being a founding member and financier of al-Qaeda. …
He says he ripped off his shirt and showed the Canadians his injuries. He also says he told them he had lied to his American interrogators and told them whatever they wanted to hear because he was scared and wanted them to stop torturing him.
Khadr says they accused him of lying, and passed information from their interviews to U.S. officials.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/03/26/khadr-lawyers.html
Documentarians need to heed the example of artists like Radio Head who have released their new album on the internet for free and asked for donations. The average person that watches documentaries is not the same audience as a hollywood crowd. A good strategy would be to release it on a website as a download for a nominal fee ($5) and offer the user the chance to contribute more if they feel.
The artist should then set up regional screening events in public spaces and should be able to generate revenue from that. If you go the mainstream distributor route with these films it kind of misses the point. They are a different animal and artists should be thinking about being innovators on the distribution level… and keeping their profits as opposed to just getting a small cut.
John R
You are correct about the disconnect in America, it must be that people are using what they have been taught to do in extra-ordinary times. That intellectuaizing is the same as understanding.
simonhhh - these are not the kinds of movies that make one amourous after watching them - so people tend to wait until they go to TV.
Alex Gibney, director of “Taxi to the Dark Side” was on The Hour a few weeks back:
http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/video.php?id=2006
John Cusack will be on next week.
RE: The other is always the “bad guy” even when we engage in equally reprehensible behavior. / it just switches who is wearing the white hats .vs. the black hats
I even saw this idea that it is only bad when the bad guys do it in an episode of Dora the Explorer when I was over at my brother’s a couple weeks back. I tried mentioning something about it not being very nice cutting the rope when the (looks like a raccoon) was climbing the mountain and my brother told me not to say anything bad about Dora.
It could be just that my brother was in a cantancorous mood or that I had previously went into a rant over how we should reclaim the use of the word “thongs” for the footwear (flip-flops sound too much like the Liberals) - but the point is that it does instill the idea in preschoolers that what you do to people who are construed as not as good as yourselves is deemed OK. They wonder why kids bully!
Personally, I see a single episode of a show that shows the “good” guys doing bad things to the “bad” character AND it is presented as appropriate behavior, my kid didn’t watch the show again AND he got a lecture.
Now that he is 16, he just gets the lecture.
bobpomeroy–You’re right. The case of Alyssa Peterson warrants more investigation. I read that she had TWO gunshot wounds to the head, suggesting that she might have been murdered because she refused to participate in “enhanced interrogations.” This happened very early in the war, perhaps a warning to others to go along with the atrocities. Chilling.
Two gunshots! I never heard that. It casts an entirely different light on the story, not only as to the hinted at suicide (which forms the basis, I believe, for the family’s desire for privacy) but further, as you say. In any event, her story merits greater exposure than has been accorded it. These people who talk about keeping the war going to prevent lives being lost in vain really need to hear either version. This woman of superior character and intellect is an American hero, and should become an icon like Nathan Hale (a distant cousin of mine). She was just a simple patriot in deciding to use her linguistic talent to learn arabic and then to give an account of her experience, leaving it to others to disseminate.