Standard Operating Procedure (Blu-ray)

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Pundits like to bash Hollywood and the media for their "liberal" bias. Well, it took so long for "liberal" Hollywood to give Oscars to documentarians Michael Moore and Errol Morris that the latter exclaimed, "I thought it would never happen." Well, Mr. Morris, Oscar or no Oscar, your works have shed light on the truth across a wide range of subjects. Oscar or no Oscar, you are a great man in your own way.

"Standard Operating Procedure", Errol Morris´s latest effort, is a measured, analytical, but unmistakably angry dissection of the events that took place at Abu Ghraib. In a facility used by Saddam Hussein to execute more than 30,000 political prisoners, members of the U.S. military humiliated detainees and took thousands of photos, thereby documenting their own depraved behavior. Of course, it´s never as simple as, "The camera captured reality." Many of the poses were staged precisely because the soldiers had cameras. This is not a new idea to anyone familiar with visual theory, but the point merits being raised again and again, especially when there are severe socio-political ramifications.

The photos are truly sick, not necessarily because the contents exceed the level of disgustingness that regularly populates fictional films but because they are real. Real people were forced into human pyramids while naked. Real people had underwear pulled over their heads. Real people were scared to the point that they urinated on themselves. You´ll hear some segments of the population braying about how the ends justify the means because we have to catch America´s enemies. Guess what? Most of what was done in Abu Ghraib (and undoubtedly elsewhere) HAD NO MILITARY OBJECTIVE WHATSOEVER.

Morris employs a wide array of techniques, including contemporary talking heads interviews, re-enactments, digital montages of the photos, fades, wipes, and archival footage. There are several passages with a young woman reading aloud letters that she wrote to her lover. The camera highlights and focuses key text passages. Sometimes, Morris opts for negative images, turning words on paper into eerie, x-ray-like ghosts. All of this is accompanied by a music score, composed by Danny Elfman, that is unsettling and disquieting. The score does not have the usual Elfman-esque touches, and it is possibly his best score ever. The effects are startling; this may be a documentary, but it unfolds like a horror story (which it is).

At first glance, it seems like "Standard Operating Procedure" is simply an investigation of a specific event. However, like all great art, the movie is about more than the contents within its boundaries. The movie is about the betrayal of the principles of decency. The movie is about the betrayal of hard-working grunts from working-class backgrounds by the insulated rich. The movie is about the greed of businessmen who cynically exploit the patriotism and naïveté of young men and women. (Instead of protecting museums filled with priceless historical artifacts and instead of protecting civilians from thugs, our soldiers were ordered to safeguard oil and gas assets when they first entered Iraq.) In essence, we have lost the leadership of the free world because we vacated the moral high ground.