Zero Dark Thirty is a documentary based film on the September 2001 terrorist attacks. The majority of this movie Takes place in the Middle East where the CIA in stationed and trying to find the whereabouts of Osama Bin-Laden.The search is led by Maya, a CIA agent who, at first, seems a bit squeamish. There have been countless representations of this historical event including photographs and films. I personally think a film can get the point across that the author is trying to portray better than a stationary photograph. In a photo there can be many interpretations and even misrepresentations. In a film there is no question about what is happening. In a film you don’t have to try and depict what is going on because it is played out for you. There is an acceptation to this and it is that if the photograph is from the actual event on September 11, 2001 from a bystander that would clearly be more accurate than a remake of the event in a film. When a nonfictional storyline is altered in any kind of way it will bring the value of accuracy down increasingly. As the accuracy gets farther away from the truth the representation leans more towards being considered …show more content…
When the movie was released there was a lot of criticism for this part stating that “Some critics have argued that it “glorifies torture" or even constitutes "torture porn". Director Kathryn Bigelow has replied that "depiction is not endorsement".” (Tunzelmann, Alex) These facts were drawn from a critic’s data and are pretty accurate from my point of view. The practices shown in the beginning stages of the movie with what the CIA has admitted about their enhanced interrogation techniques, or EIT, are profoundly disturbing in many ways. Historically, the torture sense are accurate as the CIA did in fact use the techniques such as waterboarding, forcing suspects into crammed spaces, and sleep
Films are necessary in our time period because the human eye can articulate the message intended through sight allowing visual imagination to occur. In the book, world 2 by Max Brooks, he creates a character by the name Roy Elliot who was a former movie director. Roy Elliot manages to make a movie titled “Victory at Avalon: The Battle of the Five Colleges” and some how it goes viral. Similarly, Frank Capra’s film, “Why we Fight” expresses a sense of understanding the meaning of wars. Films do not inevitably portray truth because they display what the film director views as important and beneficial for people to know.
But Moore's movie isn't just an anti-war movie. Part of the movie is an attempt to question and expose the political images being projected. This starts off with a dreamy sequence of Al Gore celebrating victory in Florida that, Moore says, was manipulated by Fox television into a Bush vict...
In the book, The CIA in Hollywood, by Tricia Jenkins, Jenkins explains a brief and clear demonstration on how the CIA has heavily sought to team up with Hollywood to develop certain plans since the 1990s. Jenkins’ intent is to inform the ‘largely hidden history of the CIA in Hollywood’ and to specify how ‘this model of secret influence’ functions (53). Jenkins covers CIA portrayal and involvement, from the Cold War, when it was mostly ‘depicted in a very negative light,’ (133) to the current 9/11 era, as it is ‘trying to circulate whitewashed images of itself through popular media.’ (137).
This film could practically confirm every conspiracy theory ever, giving the viewers the idea that everything the government puts forth is a lie. The government is portrayed as an orchestration of almost con-artists that one man was thrust into the middle of and completely demolished. The movie operates under the idea that politics are fickle and there is no monitoring
An image has the explicit power of telling a story without saying any words, that’s the power behind a photo. A photo tends to comes with many sides to a story, it has the ability to manipulate and tell something differently. There is a tendency in America, where explicit photos of war or anything gruesome occurring in the world are censored for the public view. This censorship hides the reality of our world. In “The War Photo No One Would Publish” Torie DeGhett centers her argument on censorship, detailing the account of graphic Gulf War photo the American press refused to publish. (73) DeGhett argues that the American public shouldn’t be restrained from viewing graphic content of the war occurring around the world. She believes that incomplete
Ross, Brian and Richard Esposito. “CIA's Harsh Interrogation Techniques Described.” 18 Nov. 2005. Web. 6 Nov. 2013.
One of the most famous photographs in history was taken by Joe Rosenthal at the Battle of Iwo Jima, during the Second World War. The American people on a whole embraced this photo and saw it as a firm success for the army, so the government knowing that the war needed lots of added funds decided to cease this opportunity and sent the survivors of the flag razing on a propaganda based bond drive for the army. Clint Eastwood in the way he directed the film showed just how different an image of war is compared to a real war. Clint Eastwood allowed the viewer to get an insight to all three survivors of the photo and this gave an insight to how the war on Iwo Jima and the image that gave them a entirely different course in the war. The dissimilarities between battle at Iwo Jima and the bond drive are evident through the ways in which Clint Eastwood showed what all three men were thinking at different times throughout the bond drive of America.
Ever since movies began to be made after historical events they always include inaccuracies in the ways they depict them. Film’s ability to offer visual representation of historical events sure beat reading a book due to the fact they fill the viewer up with information and entertainment. History films are a stand-in for reality, leading the viewer to witness wars, and events as if he/she is present during that time. Directors tend to see the injunction to present the past accurately in terms of plot and set design and do whatever it is possible to get these details right. The focus of some directors is to catch the viewers’ attention so that people will actually go see the film. They are often forced to sacrifice real events and add a twist to it so that it becomes more entertaining to watch. In the movies; Flags of our Fathers, The Great Raid, The Thin Red Line, and Pearl Harbor directors did whatever they could to depict events accurately. Major events are described as they really happened, but there is always something added that did not exactly occur from what the textbook tel...
The US Reservations of the UN Convention against Torture defines torture as “any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining information from a person.” Waterboarding fits into this definition very well. In the “How to Do It” article waterboarding is described as filling up the upper respiratory system with water causing both physical and mental pain. This causes the person being tortured to feel like they are drowning without them actually dying from the drowning. For the person experiencing it, it may even be worse because the article states that “his sufferings must be that of a man who is drowning, but cannot drown,” so it is never ending. So even though the person is not in real physical danger, the panic caused by this method of interrogation causes both physical suffering and great mental suffering. In the definition of torture it says it is torture whether it causes physical or mental suffering, and water boarding does both!
Enhanced interrogation methods include hypothermia, stress positions, waterboarding, and sleep deprivation. In each of these cases there have been studies such as, the one concocted by Dr. Allen Keller, of Bellevue NYU Program for Survivors of Torture. Dr. Keller once said, “Some victims were still traumatized years later. A man who had experienced waterboarding couldn’t take showers and panics when it rains.” In January 22, 2009, President Obama, signed an executive order that requires both the U.S. military and paramilitary organizations to use the Army Field Manual as the guide of getting information from prisoners, moving widely away from the Bush administration tactics. In this manual none of these enhanced interrogation methods are acceptable. If indeed, any person or persons were caught using any of these outlawed interrogation methods, they would be subject to a fine of 10,000 dollars and a life term of imprisonment. This is true even if you showed the intent to commit torture, but never actually committed the crime. If there is sufficient evidence to prove intent, then you are subject to 25 years of imprisonment. The means to not justify the necessity when it comes to enhanced interrogation. It can lead to false information, if someone is falsely accused of a crime and therefore detained by the military with no evidence and then tortured; in most scenarios an innocent person will admit to their accusation to avoid the undeniable pain of torture. There has to be due process and torture should and never will be the answer. All in all, enhanced interrogation is a technique used to induce information from possible suspects; however, this technique is immoral in ways such as, but not limited to, impacting the victims life, f...
In the article, “The Torture Myth,” Anne Applebaum explores the controversial topic of torture practices, focused primarily in The United States. The article was published on January 12, 2005, inspired by the dramatic increase of tensions between terrorist organizations and The United States. Applebaum explores three equality titillating concepts within the article. Applebaum's questions the actual effectiveness of using torture as a means of obtaining valuable information in urgent times. Applebaum explores the ways in which she feels that the United States’ torture policy ultimately produces negative effects upon the country. Applebaum's final question is if torture is not optimally successful, why so much of society believes it works efficiently.
Brian Ross, a writer for CBS news, reported that former and current intelligence officers and their supervisors “used enhanced interrogation techniques to gather intelligence information from detainees” (Ross, 2005). Intelligence officers describe having used “enhanced interrogation techniques” in bases in Northern Europe and Asia since 2002. There are six techniques used commonly. Most of the techniques are designed not to cause any permanent harm. They instill fear and
Photojournalist Mark Hancock once wrote: “ A journalist tells a stories. A photographer takes pictures, a photojournalist takes the best of both and locks it into a powerful medium”. For many years visuals such as photos have been used to add context to an article, photo’s can allow the reader to relate and or understand the story better. Rather than just reading about an event photo’s that accompany a story connect the viewer to the story in ways that words can not. That being said, although photojournalist photos are meant to be transparent and accurate it is becoming more and more apparent that news outlets and freelance photojournalists are manipulating and photoshopping images. Photojournalist are constantly finding themselves having to detach themselves from their subjects and act quickly and often times because they work in such fast paced environments they are on the receiving end of
The act of torture is something my family often has discussions about, since this is one of the controversial topics my family is passionate about. Like most people, some of my family members are against it, while others are for it. Growing up hearing about these discussions, left me feeling extremely curious, however unlike my parents and other family members, I wasn’t confident and couldn’t decide whether I was for or against torture. Therefore, after finding out that one of the options we could use as our topics for our editorial was torture, I was naturally and obviously intrigued. Therefore, I decided to take the opportunity to look at torture from both perspectives in hopes of being able to finally decide whether I am for or against this controversial topic.
There are many methods of enhance interrogation, that it used. In some cases prisoners are exposed to sleep depravation. This is where prisons are kept up with no sleep for a long period of time. Some are known to stay up for 11 straight days (“Interrogation”, par 2). Other prisoners are known to go throw forced nudity and being exposed to their biggest fears (“Interrogation, par. 6). Other methods are as listed: harassment, alcohol tolerance, hypnotism, walling, facial hold, slapping, cramped confinement, mental torture, threats, exposure to unpleasant and inhuman treatments (Calkins, 33)(Blakeley, 547, 550)