by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
Upon the suggestion of long time and valued blog contributor James in LA, this column on “Zero Dark Thirty” and the controversy surrounding that film is offered as a supplement to the earlier entry in the series on propaganda,”Propaganda 102: Holly Would and the Power of Images“. It is in part movie review and in part a critical examination of the film’s content as related to the controversy around whether or not this film is pro-torture propaganda. Thank you for the excellent suggestion, James!
Is “Zero Dark Thirty” (ZDT) a good film? Is ZDT propaganda? If so, is it pro-torture propaganda (i.e. does it support or promote the idea of torture as a valid and/or necessary intelligence gathering methodology)? Let us examine these questions . . .
ZDT is well paced, the cinematography is strong and it is well written by Mark Boal – all tributes to the technical expertise behind this film being first rate and director Kathryn Bigelow ties it all together in a better than average Hollywood package. The 157 minute running time moves rapidly and keeps you engaged. As a film, ZDT works. Kind of. And I’ll get to that, but first, the acting.
The supporting cast is a veritable who’s who of some of today’s best character actors from James Gandolfini (“The Sopranos”, “Where the Wild Things Are”) to Harold Perrineau (“The Matrix Reloaded”, “Lost” and “Oz”) to Stephen Dillane (“Game of Thrones” and even more notably Thomas Jefferson in the “John Adams” HBO mini-series) to Mark Strong (perennial Guy Ritchie gangster favorite, “Tinker, Tailor, Solider, Spy”) to John Barrowman (known to any Whovian and “Torchwood” fans as Capt. Jack Harkness). Many of these strong actors though are a bit wasted on parts that often are only a couple of lines and/or scenes, but their presence does greatly contribute to the overall quality of the film. Three actors really drive the film and get the bulk of the screen time: Jessica Chastain (“The Help”, “The Debt”), Jason Clarke (“Lawless”, “Public Enemies”), and Jennifer Ehle (“Contagion”, “The Ides of March”, “The King’s Speech”). My compliments to the cast and crew on skilful execution of their jobs. Especially the lovely Jennifer Ehle who is as strong a stand out in this film’s deep ensemble cast as she was as the scene stealing epidemiologist she played in the equally strong cast of “Contagion”.
Character-wise the film’s primary focus is on Chastain’s “Maya”, Clarke’s “Dan” and Ehle’s “Jessica” and in some ways they are representations of two different schools of thought on how to best gather intelligence. Maya is the young blood. New to field intelligence work, she’s thrown into the deep end. Her first field assignment and her first scene is with Dan as he is in mid-torture, er, interrogation. Maya is the audience proxy into Dan’s “Torture Works!” world and into Jessica’s “Old School/We Have Rules” world. Her choice is clear and it is clear from the first scene. She’s with Dan.
The torture itself is brutal and inhumane and the character Dan comes across as a pure psychopath and a sadist. Dan alternates charm with threats, beatings, stress positions (including cramped confinement), humiliation, and waterboarding. The waterboarding depicted is done so in a spontaneous and off hand way that is seems almost a casual aside. We know from memos from Cheney’s lawyers that the practice was methodical and repetitive. This is not the only time the film deviates from what we know to be the reality of torture. The other is that torture led to a detainee revealing the nom de guerre of OBL’s courier when it has been revealed that this information was in fact part of a larger traditional human and signal intelligence operations. In the real world, almost all of the information acquired through “enhanced interrogation techniques” was recalled because it was inherently unreliable.
Dan is the least sympathetic character of the film, but I don’t think he’s meant to be unsympathetic. He’s just a guy with a tough job. Maya is at first a bit taken aback, seemingly uncomfortable by Dan’s torture techniques, although she rather quickly (almost unbelievably so) opts to participate instead of watching although her involvement in the torture proper is fairly passive compared to Dan. To show how tough she is, she assures Dan she’s “fine” when asked. In one fell swoop, the young blood becomes true believer. This is all within the first fifteen minutes mind you. The torture component is only in the first part of the film, but it does set the tone thematically and as Maya character development. Maya meets Jessica afterwards in a mid-level status update meeting among the various CIA assets running ground operations in Pakistan. Jessica advocates using greed as a motivating factor to encourage people to bring them actionable intelligence. Later, Maya offhandedly dismisses this tactic by noting “it worked well enough in the Cold War” and rationalizing her tacit approval of Dan’s techniques under the rubric that the enemy are fanatics. The relationship of Jessica and Maya is important later down the road as they become friends despite their differences. This is important to the analysis of whether this film constitutes pro-torture propaganda, but the basic progression of the film is fairly simple. Torture, misadventures in human intelligence gathering, solid lead, decision to act, apprehension, afterward/closing.
At the most basic level, ZDT is a well made film. On that level, I must say it was a good movie. Not everything that is propaganda is excluded from being art. In cinema, the prime example of that is “Casablanca”. It was certainly pro-Allied propaganda in the “good people choose to act against the Nazis” kind of way. That in no way interferes with enjoying it as a film and in part because the message is one that just about everyone not a Nazi can agree with. That is not the case with ZDT and it is part and parcel of why it almost works as a movie. ZDT is certainly a piece of propaganda in the most negative meaning of the word. It presents a clear and unambiguous portrait of torture as being critical to intelligence gathering and it does so from the first scene. This message is irrevocably fundamentally wrong from both a human rights and Constitutional standpoint as well as an outright lie about the role of torture in capturing bin Laden. It is revisionist history of the worst sort; the kind designed to whitewash the actions of bad actors.
Not only does the new blood Maya quickly buy in to the torture paradigm of information gathering, it is never once denounced by any character. This includes the “voice of traditional intelligence methods” character of Jessica. She voices her opinion in favor of traditional techniques, but she seems otherwise perfectly fine with Dan’s methods. That Dan’s methods are justified is further illustrated by traditional human and signal intelligence as being portrayed is not only ineffective but a direct causal factor in the death of the Jessica character which serves as the final impetus for the Maya character to kill bin Laden. And it’s consistently and from the get go kill bin Laden – no talk is had of capture. Maya wants him dead and will stop at nothing until he’s dead. Several other characters take action based upon or make comment of the value of the “detainee program”. Dan leaves the field and goes back to Washington in part because he’s “burned out” in the unintentionally least sympathetic scene in the whole film. Po’ ol’ Psycho Dan is just worn out from all that torturing. He’s “seen too many naked men.” Of course, that he smells the changes on the political wind and wants to get out before he gets caught does nothing to enhance sympathy for the psychopath’s plight. His interest is strictly in himself and his self-preservation. He even warns Maya that she “doesn’t want to be the last one left holding the dog collar” before going home, in reference to the earlier torture scene where Dan makes a prisoner wear a dog collar and walks him around the cell. The CIA Station Chief Joseph Bradley (played by Kyle Chandler) bemoans the loss of the detainee program as does Mark Strong’s character George, a nebulously defined CIA manager fairly high up the food chain and in charge of the task force that employs Maya. These commentaries stand out in stark contrast to what the later half of the movie shows, namely that human and signal intelligence are the means which ultimately lead to bin Laden’s capture despite the dogged insistence that the initial break came from torture. Even when prisoners choose to cooperate, they make it clear it is because they do not want to be tortured further.
Some in the press are speculating that Bigelow was played by the CIA’s right wing elements that followed Cheney’s lead on torture. Some think she’s a right wing ideologue endorsing torture herself. I say it is irrelevant to the end product being propaganda by merit of having a decidedly pro-torture message. Dupe or willing propagandist, the product is propaganda just the same.
ZDT is propaganda at its blackest. It starts with torture, never criticizes torture, bemoans the loss of the tool and never waivers that it was instrumental in capturing bin Laden despite the reality to the contrary. It ends with Maya on a plane home, crying – unrepentant, unquestioning, tears of her sacrifice that ignore her part in war crimes, still very much the hero. And that is the final nail in the coffin that makes ZDT almost work as a movie. There is no examination of whether torture is wrong or not. Just a tacit endorsement writ large in the self-pitying tears of the lead actress as she rides off into the sunset.
As the credits rolled, from behind me I heard another theater patron say, “Well . . . f@ck.” I turned to see a college kid with a t-shirt bearing the text of the 8th Amendment. I smiled a slight sad smile, tipped my ball cap to him and his girlfriend. “Nice t-shirt,” I said. They waved before walking away hand in hand up the aisle, excitedly mumbling to each other in that insular way young lovers do.
I knew how they felt. It was cold and rainy outside as I exited the side door of the theater opposite the young couple. It was rainy and cold in my heart. I thought, “So many people are going to see this movie and buy its bullshit without questioning the message, or worse, believing it.” But maybe not. Maybe it will backfire and act as unintentional agitprop to reinvigorate the discussion about torture and what we should do to hold those responsible accountable. Ah, hope. Our greatest strength as a species and concurrently our greatest weakness. But I digress.
There has been much defense in the media played by many involved with the film. Director Kathryn Bigelow said, “We depicted a variety of controversial practices and intelligence methods that were used in the name of finding bin Laden. The film shows that no single method was necessarily responsible for solving the manhunt, nor can any single scene taken in isolation fairly capture the totality of efforts the film dramatizes.” Which is utter nonsense as every bit of intelligence gathered is predicated on torture forcing a prisoner to tell us the nom de guerre of OBL’s courier when in real life we knew that from other traditional sources of intelligence. It’s abundantly clear in the film that no progress would have been made without torture first revealing that bit of information. Even a Sony executive weighed in. “We are outraged that any responsible member of the Academy would use their voting status in AMPAS as a platform to advance their own political agenda,” said Amy Pascal, co-chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment and chairman of its Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group. “This film should be judged free of partisanship,” she said, adding that the film “does not advocate torture.” Also utter nonsense and anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of propaganda can tell it is utter nonsense by the content of the film. The film doesn’t explicitly endorse torture, true, but the implicit endorsement practically screams off of the screen. Thanks, Amy, but I think I’ll judge the movie by simple human decency and the fact that torture is unconstitutional and illegal and any film that acts as a tacit endorsement of torture is vile no matter how well made it is. Then again, what do you care? You got my money and I’m not a member of the AMPAS. I will, however, probably choose to vote with my dollar on the next film either you or Kathryn Bigelow are attached to that I might be interested in seeing as well as any product in general from Sony or Columbia/Tri-Star. I don’t think I’ll see another Kathryn Bigelow film even if it’s so good it makes you cry tears of gold, sweat happy playful puppies and smell like fresh baked cookies.
I don’t regret seeing the film. It was not a waste of time. It is an excellent study piece in propaganda. It was well made. However, I do wish I had my money back. People who advocate torture – even implicitly – shouldn’t get a dime for doing so. Having seen this, I urge you to see it for as free as possible and make up your own mind in light of what you have learned from this series or elsewhere about the nature of propaganda.
If you’ve seen it or not, but especially if you have, what do you think?
Source(s): “Zero Dark Thirty“, CNN, Global Research
~submitted by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
The Propaganda Series;
Propaganda 105: How to Spot a Liar
Propaganda 104 Supplemental: The Streisand Effect and the Political Question
Propaganda 104 Supplemental: The Sound of Silence
Propaganda 104: Magica Verba Est Scientia Et Ars Es
Propaganda 103: The Word Changes, The Word Remains The Same
Propaganda 102: Holly Would and the Power of Images
Propaganda 101 Supplemental: Build It And They Will Come (Around)
Propaganda 101: What You Need to Know and Why or . . .
Related articles of interest;
UPDATE: More Bigelow on the defense . . .
From: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/16/kathryn-bigelow-bin-laden-zero-dark-thirty_n_2486376.html
“First of all: I support every American’s 1st Amendment right to create works of art and speak their conscience without government interference or harassment,” Bigelow wrote. “As a lifelong pacifist, I support all protests against the use of torture, and, quite simply, inhumane treatment of any kind. But I do wonder if some of the sentiments alternately expressed about the film might be more appropriately directed at those who instituted and ordered these U.S. policies, as opposed to a motion picture that brings the story to the screen.”
True, true . . . and may it be so, but you didn’t stop there.
“I thankfully want to say that I’m standing in a room of people who understand that depiction is not endorsement, and if it was, no artist could ever portray inhumane practices,” Bigelow said while accepting the organization’s award for Best Director. “No author could ever write about them, and no filmmaker could ever delve into the knotty subjects of our time.”
Well your train goes off the track there, Katie. If you’re such a pacifist, why doesn’t a single character once question the use of torture? Hmmm? Your content belies your assertion that it is not an endorsement of torture. See, when you present one side of an argument but not the other and portray that side as critical to the success/resolution of the story? That’s called advocacy.
advocacy /ˈadvəkəsi/, n.,
1: public support for or recommendation of a particular cause or policy:
Denounce all you like now. The film is out of the box and it is what it is and it says what it says. You had the perfect chance to make this film into defensibly what you claim it to be in the character of Jessica – the only character with a moral center in the story – to have at a bare minimum be critical of the practice of torture. But you didn’t take it.
The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
Gene, does due process matter at all? it did not happen.
If bush had committed this special ops murder it would be a huge part of the discussion.
selective hatred, like all prejudice. tunnel vision.
“I thankfully want to say that I’m standing in a room of people who understand that depiction is not endorsement”
Gene,
I hate to re-use an analogy but can’t you see D.W. Griffith and Leni Reifenstiehl saying the same thing if they were around today. From what you wrote her depiction certainly was advocacy.
Truthseeker,
That is powerful….
“Power that is not constrained by humanity is not constrained by anything at all.” Leonard Pitts
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/02/the-torture-memos-10-years-later/252439/
The Torture Memos, 10 Years Later
FEB 6 2012, 8:30 AM ET
Our journey toward Abu Ghraib began in earnest with a single document — written and signed without the knowledge of the American people
Reuters
On February 7, 2002 — ten years ago to the day, tomorrow — President George W. Bush signed a brief memorandum titled “Humane Treatment of Taliban and al Qaeda Detainees.” The caption was a cruel irony, an Orwellian bit of business, because what the memo authorized and directed was the formal abandonment of America’s commitment to key provisions of the Geneva Convention. This was the day, a milestone on the road to Abu Ghraib: that marked our descent into torture — the day, many would still say, that we lost part of our soul. ” (excerpt)
Abu Ghraib – prison abuse / torture
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib
Torture and our society.
The Stanford Prison Project and The Lucifer Effect Philip Zimbardo –
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Zimbardo
History on punishment in Arizona and America leading to torture and abuse in Abu Ghraib 2004 for starters.
Sunbelt Justice: Arizona and the Transformation of American Punishment – Mona Lynch
http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=17521
David Blauw, You described it very well. Ethics do not stop at borders. Unfortunately, war and the U.S. mass industrial prison complex go hand in hand. How they treat those outside the borders, as the former American (outside prison consultants) prison wardens and officers come back from setting up foreign prisons where torture took place, are bringing the tactics and practices back to our jails / prisons / detention centers.
Then there’s Guantanamo that sits “outside” of the law, where anything goes. It’s shameful. Holding prisoners who were deemed innocent by the courts and cleared for release 8 years ago, 6 years ago, etc. Sitting “indefinitely” — lost in the fray. One recently died and who have gone home long ago. Sold into the system as a teenager for a bounty.
What are we becoming as a nation? Time to SHUT down Guantanamo. People need to work on releasing the innocent prisoners. It’s been 11 years since it opened and the world is watching and getting angrier.
The US use to occupy the high ground. (or my youth failed to see the propaganda) A major concern of condoning torture: Our enemies have full justification to use it against us. Colin Powell and many other military persons have used this as a reason NOT to torture.
Occupying the high ground and maintaining it, is a noble human and societal goal. Human Ethical Nobility seems to have lost its place in this discussion.
The propaganda being oxygenated in the (go along-get along-make money) press, seems to be American hegemony first, then Profit, Ego, Dominance etc…. High ground … 5th? or 10th?
Ethics do not stop at borders, The Ethics we practice globally are the ethics other countries judge us by. Woe is us Pogo.
James in LA
So Bush and Cheney will someday atone for the practice of torture. No problem. Should Obama and Biden face consequence for assassination? Increased drone attacks? Collateral damage?
Is murder more humane than water boarding?
You make no comment regarding current policy.
Did you listen to the confirmation hearings on Holder? Responding to a direct question, he did not rule out torture under merited circumstances.
They could not pay me to go watch such heinous rot.
Experts Discuss the Status of Guantanamo Bay | C-SPAN
http://www.c-span.org/Events/Experts-Discuss-the-Status-of-Guantanamo-Bay/10737437188-1/
“Jose Rodriguez should be in jail for obstruction of justice and destruction of evidence and that’s just for starts.”
Yep.
Jose Rodriguez should be in jail for obstruction of justice and destruction of evidence and that’s just for starts.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/01/11/zero_dark_torture
Zero Dark Torture
Viewers and critics have been shocked by Zero Dark Thirty’s depiction of enhanced interrogation techniques. But, if anything, the film goes way too easy on the CIA.
BY LAURA PITTER | JANUARY 11, 2013
“Zero Dark Thirty, the movie drama of the hunt for Osama bin Laden, has spawned a wide array of commentary. None is as misleading or morally disturbing, however, as the one from former CIA counterterrorism chief Jose Rodriguez, who seized on the film as an opportunity to defend — and completely distort — the CIA torture program he supervised. This from the guy who, ignoring instructions from the White House and CIA, destroyed 92 videotapes depicting the waterboarding of detainees in CIA custody, claiming it was to protect the identities of CIA operatives on the tapes.
In Rodriguez’s rosy version of events, the CIA program was “carefully monitored and conducted,” bearing “little resemblance to what is shown on the screen.” Most detainees, he claims, received “no enhanced interrogation techniques,” and for those who did it was only after written authorization was obtained.
Zero Dark Thirty has many factual inaccuracies, about which U.S. senators with access to the classified record have publicly complained. More important is that the film may leave viewers with the false impression that the U.S. government’s use of torture was an ugly but necessary part of the fight against terrorism.
In Rodriguez’s rewrite, however, the torture program sounds like a well-guided walk in the park. What we know from released government documents and multiple interviews with people in the program, though, is that Rodriguez’s description of the program bears little resemblance to reality. Although the CIA did initiate guidelines requiring written permission before so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” (EITs) were used, the CIA’s own inspector general’s report says these guidelines were not formalized until the end of January 2003, when EITs were already in use. And though the guidelines were an improvement, the inspector general said, they still left “substantial room for misinterpretation and [did] not cover all Agency detention and interrogation activities.”
Research I did for a September 2012 Human Rights Watch report documented the experiences of five Libyan opponents of the government of Muammar al-Qaddafi probably detained under the CIA program. During their time in U.S. custody — ranging from eight months to two years — they said they were chained to walls in pitch-dark cells, often naked, sometimes while diapered, for weeks or months at a time; restrained in painful stress positions for as long as two weeks; forced into cramped spaces; beaten; repeatedly slammed into walls; kept inside for nearly three months without the ability to bathe or cut their hair or nails (“We looked like monsters,” one detainee said); denied food and sleep; and subjected to continuous, deafeningly loud music. They were held incommunicado with no visits from the International Committee of the Red Cross. Their families had no idea whether they were alive or dead. From released documents, we also know that techniques like placing a detainee with a known fear of bugs “in a cramped confinement box with an insect,” and then falsely telling him it would sting, were approved for use.
Rodriguez claims, “No one was hung from ceilings” in the CIA program. Yet, of the five detainees interviewed for our report, two said they were restrained in cells with their hands above their heads. One said he was kept this way for three days while naked, forced to urinate on himself; the other said he was restrained with his hands above his head for about 15 days, in an extremely cold cell while naked except for a diaper. He was only taken out of the room about five times for questioning. A third detainee said he was restrained with his handcuffed wrists above his head while kept in a tall narrow box with speakers on both sides of his head, just inches from his ears, blasting loud music. He was in this box, naked, without food, for a day and a half. Other detainees have described similarly being restrained from above at what appears to be the same location.
Rodriguez also said, as have other CIA officials in the past, that only three detainees, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah, and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, were waterboarded in the program — though the CIA qualified this a bit after our report came out, saying it was on record as having said there were only three “substantiated” cases of waterboarding. Yet one of the five Libyan detainees I spoke with (though not using the term “waterboarded”) gave credible testimony that he was frequently strapped to a wooden board, with a hood over his head, while water was poured over his nose and mouth to the point that he felt like he would suffocate. Another detainee said he was threatened with use of the board but that it was never used on him.
Both said they were subjected to another type of suffocation-inducing water abuse that, like waterboarding, is a form of torture. Each was forced, separately, to lie in plastic sheeting, hooded, sometimes while naked, while guards poured icy cold water all over them, including over their nose and mouth, to the point where they felt they would suffocate. The men said doctors were present during both types of water torture, raising issues of medical ethics.
Moreover, Rodriguez doesn’t mention the number of times waterboarding was used on each detainee he acknowledges — 183 on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, at least 83 on Abu Zubaydah, and twice on Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri — and the sensation of near death the practice produces.
Rodriguez also claims that “no one was bloodied or beaten in the enhanced interrogation program,” ignoring that some of the longest-lasting effects of torture are psychological. But many detainees others and we have interviewed, including the Libyans, did describe being beaten in the program, especially during transfer procedures. And some were sent to other countries by the CIA with the knowledge and understanding that they would be beaten and tortured there.
These are just a few of the details we know about the CIA program. Unfortunately, there is still a lot we do not know. We still don’t know, for example, all the names of those held as part of the program, how long they were detained, when they were released, and what happened to them. The details that are known have been pieced together by journalists and human rights workers tracking down former detainees, filing Freedom of Information Act requests, and litigating.
The U.S. government has gone to great lengths to keep information about the program secret. The Justice Department refused to prosecute Rodriguez for destruction of evidence — those 92 videotapes depicting waterboarding — or any other senior U.S. official or CIA operative involved in the abuse for that matter, despite a four-year investigation. (Rodriguez was lightly reprimanded by the CIA.)
Meanwhile, the Senate Intelligence Committee recently produced a report — more than 6,000 pages long — that provides the most comprehensive information about the CIA’s torture program. Congress has yet to make the report public, though the Senate Intelligence Committee chair, Dianne Feinstein, said it “uncovers startling details” about the program and raises critical questions about intelligence operations and oversight. She has also said it concludes that the use of enhanced interrogation techniques was not an effective way to gain intelligence and did not lead to finding bin Laden. Rodriguez, who had left the CIA years before the bin Laden operation in Abbottabad, Pakistan, asserts exactly the opposite, yet evidence that rebuts his claims remains classified.
This brings us to maybe the most frustrating thing about Rodriguez’s comments and this whole debate about Zero Dark Thirty. We would not even be having this debate, and this film probably would not have even been made in the way it was, had the U.S. government not gone to such great lengths over the past 11 years to cover up the tracks of its crimes and bury the facts. Make no mistake about it: These allegations amount to crimes.
What the United States is alleged to have done in its name is torture — practices prohibited by the Convention Against Torture, ratified by the United States and 152 other countries, and U.S. law under the Anti-Torture Act. It is also prohibited during times of war by the Geneva Conventions, again ratified by the United States and virtually every other country. The U.S. government’s authorization of torture during George W. Bush’s administration violated U.S. law and should be prosecuted.
It is deeply disappointing that President Barack Obama and the Justice Department have ignored these calls for sanction. In the absence of accountability, however, the least the United States should do is publicly acknowledge and explain the reasons that the use of torture was wrong and counterproductive.
The Senate Intelligence Committee report appears to be an opportunity to do just that. Calling the use of enhanced interrogation techniques a “terrible mistake,” Feinstein said, “I also believe this report will settle the debate once and for all over whether our nation should ever employ coercive interrogation techniques.” Yet while the report remains classified, available to just a handful of senators, CIA insiders like Rodriguez are free to say what they please, and unfortunately, the debate rages on. “
Blouise, Thanks. I just read her piece. I disagree w/ her take. I did not get that @ all in the movie. We agree on Argo.
nick,
The ” … I don’t know where you get the “and only cowardly politicians question.” was part of the quote I referenced in the New Yorker … those would be Amy Davidson’s words, not mine.
Blouise, The cameo scene w/ Biden on Parks and Rec[currently the smartest sitcom w/ great writing and characters] was priceless. Much to your chagrin, the promos have Newt making a cameo along w/ Andrew Luck. I assume you’re ok w/ Luck..I bet you wish he were a Brown. That Bill Rodham crack was pure Poehler and as I said, she’s very smart and quick, as is Fey.
Daniel Day Lewis is one in a long line of classy, dignified, Brit actors. Spielberg wears his emotions on his face and your take was also mine. Regarding ZDT, I don’t know where you get the “and only cowardly politicians question.” As critics and others here have pointed out, there was virtually no politics except for the brief CNN clip in the background of Obama and then Maya’s mentor’s comment about, “the last person standing w/ a dog collar.” You know a lot about the intelligence biz. All operatives know they are always vulnerable to the ebb and flow of politics. There’s a long and sordid history on that covering numerous administrations. The “Last person standing” comment was a veteran mentor making sure his student understood how the game is played. This was a story about the front lines..the grunts as it were.
Bruce, please pay attention. The same people condemning torture also tend to condemn unsupervised drone attacks, Nice try at your continued division though. Oh, wait. It wasn’t even that.
nick and SwM,
Daniel Day Lewis’ acceptance speech was eloquent and sincerely humble. One could tell from the expressions on the faces of Spielberg and others that his words were genuinely appreciated.
Amy Poehler’s reaction to Bill Clinton’s appearance was priceless … “Wow! That was Hilary Clinton’s husband…Bill Rodham Clinton.” (It was pure ‘Parks and Recreation’ … [if you’ve watched the show then you’re also aware of her character’s obsession with Joe Biden who gave a wonderful cameo appearance on one episode])
Ben Affleck seemed to be in shock heaven and I am pleased with his win especially as Argo continually questions the use of torture … “Several times in the movie, both hardened C.I.A. agents and American diplomats wonder what we’d been thinking when we decided to support a torturer, and why we were still protecting him …” and the presentation of torture in Zero Dark Thirty wherein “torture is something that steady professionals do in quiet rooms, and that only cowardly politicians question … And Maya, the character we are meant to identify with, becomes a torturer herself.”
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/closeread/2013/01/argo-vs-zero-dark-thirty-two-takes-on-torture.html#ixzz2HyNs3z38