Today's column for the Daily Banter takes a look at the debate over torture and Zero Dark Thirty, which opens in wide release in two days.
Here's the opening shot:
"Just before the limited release of 'Zero Dark Thirty,' I wrote a column for this site that took to task those who hadn't seen the film yet but were already howling about its portrayal of the CIA's enhanced interrogation techniques -- torture by any other name -- and their effect on the manhunt for Osama bin Laden. The criticism ranged from those who believed that by taking no moral stance on torture and instead simply presenting it as a fact of the times, director Kathryn Bigelow and writer Mark Boal were in fact issuing tacit approval of torture, to those who couldn't fathom how any critic could detach him or herself from the content of the film and laud it despite knowing that it seems to falsely link torture to the capture of Bin Laden. My point at the time was simple: shut up until you actually see the movie and know what the hell you're talking about. I hadn't seen 'Zero Dark Thirty' and therefore knew I couldn't comment on it with any kind of intellectual honesty so I was willing to give the filmmakers the benefit of the doubt until such time as I had the chance to take in what I assumed would be a complex and potentially unsettling moviegoing experience for myself.
Well, yesterday I saw 'Zero Dark Thirty.'"
Read the Rest Here
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