It’s impossible to talk about Standard Operating Procedure without referencing Taxi to the Dark Side. Fortunately, both documentaries are vital to any discussion about US military interrogation techniques. While Alex Gibney’s Oscar winner uses the death of an Iraqi taxi driver as a framing device, director Errol Morris and writer Philip Gourevitch (We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families) examine the issue through visual evidence (they also collaborated on a book of the same name).
While Gibney concentrates on Bhagram, Morris focuses on Abu Ghraib, but his self-described “non-fiction horror film,” which features a dramatic Danny Elfman score and slow-motion reenactments, runs along two tracks. First, he aims to find out what happened at the infamous institution. Along with the photographs and video footage, he speaks to the guards and the brigadier general who oversaw their operations, including former army specialist Lynndie England, who has all the charm of Aileen Wuornos (so memorably immortalized in Monster). As in his Thin Blue Line, accounts contradict other accounts.
While Gibney concentrates on Bhagram, Morris focuses on Abu Ghraib, but his self-described “non-fiction horror film,” which features a dramatic Danny Elfman score and slow-motion reenactments, runs along two tracks. First, he aims to find out what happened at the infamous institution. Along with the photographs and video footage, he speaks to the guards and the brigadier general who oversaw their operations, including former army specialist Lynndie England, who has all the charm of Aileen Wuornos (so memorably immortalized in Monster). As in his Thin Blue Line, accounts contradict other accounts.
How are detainees in the DC jail fairing these days? Any documentary on how they are being treated?
Don’t expect one.
These people want to evade responsibility for their actions by blaming higher-ups. The officers were and are disgusting and not one has been prosecuted. They set the stage and encouraged this behavior. But the underlings cannot defer moral responsibility by blaming “the orders” they got. That hasn’t worked in war crimes trials in the past and it doesn’t absolve anyone here.
Prisoner abuse has been forgotten. Oh how soon we forget. But our enemies remember.
I tried to watch this but I ended up with just a black screen.
Who takes these Nazis to task? The US, have been commiting war crimes for years now. Unfortunatly Documentaries like this are now ten a penny, and the impact of it disolves in the sea of conspiricy documentaries, and therefor nothing gets done about the subject,.