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>>Errol Morris’s Standard Operating
Procedure revisits Abu Ghraib

by MARK SLUTSKY

The list of fiascos, bungles, deceptions, bad decisions and outright atrocities associated with the Iraq war is now so long as to induce outrage fatigue, that condition particular to George W. Bush’s two terms in office. That’s of course no reason to ignore them, as tempting as it might be. No matter how little effect one’s shock and anger seems to have on the grand scheme of things, it’s important not to be overwhelmed by the seemingly endless travesties, so that they don’t go forgotten or unscrutinized. You have to hold the faint hope that people might someday, no matter how unlikely it may seem, learn from their mistakes.

Which is to say, remember Abu Ghraib? The scandal, in which hundreds of photos and videos of American soldiers and MPs torturing, humiliating and otherwise abusing Iraqi prisoners—many of whom were in the notorious prison facility simply because they were fighting-age males—broke in early 2004, but it already seems so far away. Thankfully, Errol Morris hasn’t forgotten, and the acclaimed documentarian revisits the outrage in his new film, Standard Operating Procedure.

Morris is a master interviewer and he really coaxes his subjects to reveal themselves here. He talks to many of the people directly involved with the abuses, including Lynndie England, she of the famous pointing-and-smoking photo. Of course, all of the pictures that led to the public outcry were unauthorized, taken by the soldiers themselves for their own diversion.

It’s the pictures themselves that he seems to find so fascinating, not surprising if you’ve ever read Zoom, Morris’s excellent blog about the meaning of photographs he writes for the New York Times. As one interviewee says, if the photographs hadn’t been taken, the scandal wouldn’t have happened.

And it’s the people in the photos themselves, mostly low-ranking, who took the blame for the torture, starvation, sleep deprivation, horrific humiliation and even deaths that took place at the prison—not of course, their superiors, who the film makes very clear ordered people like England to “soften up” the Iraqi prisoners.

Standard Operating Procedure is a focused, intense and very angry movie. I know a documentary about U.S. abuses in Iraq four years ago is a hard sell, but regardless, it needs to be seen.

Standard Operating Procedure
opens this Friday, June 6

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