Fordham Law School discusses the use of torture in Zero Dark Thirty
Karen J. Greenberg (left center) facilitated a panel discussion at Fordham Law School about the depiction of torture in the film Zero Dark Thirty with Ali Soufan (left), Jane Meyer (right center), and Alex Gibney (right).
The theater was packed with law students, experts in interrogation techniques, FBI Agents, CIA operatives and five girls from Convent of the Sacred Heart. On January 24, the students from Mrs. Vasu’s World Literature Honors class went to a panel discussion at Fordham Law School about the film Zero Dark Thirty and the controversy surrounding torture depiction.
Director of the Center on National Security at Fordham Law School, Karen Greenberg, facilitated the discussion featuring Jane Meyer, a New Yorker Staff Writer, Ali Soufan, a former FBI Supervisory special agent and Alex Gibney, a documentarian. Each of the members of the panel offered a slightly different perspective on the depiction of the hunt for Osama bin Laden.
Ali Soufan spoke first about the ten year search for “UBL”, the code name used to refer to Osama bin Laden. It was a collaborative effort involving the FBI, particularly the New York unit, and the CIA. Soufan thought the movie was narrow minded in its focus on the CIA’s involvement in capturing bin Laden. Additionally, enhanced interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding, were portrayed in the movie as being influential in capturing bin Laden. According to Mr. Soufan, not only was this not the case, but enhanced interrogation techniques were often not the most efficient technique.
“The courier of the 9/11 attack was waterboarded 183 times and gave incorrect information,” Ali Soufan said.
This panel also discussed Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal’s screenplay, which they felt was rushed and glamorized. Jane Meyer and Alex Gibney focused on how the story line of the movie did not have much perspective. Acknowledging the value of storytelling in the movie, both thought that Bigelow could have made more of an effort to emphasize that the movie was a fictionalized account of the capturing of Osama bin Laden.
“The movie left out any sense of perspective,” Alex Gibney said. “Where were the other agents and the FBI agents who were horrified by torture?”
Although questions like these and other comments during the panel were interesting and came from diverse points of view, the panel spent little time discussing how torture was used in the movie. This might have been because the entire panel was in agreement that the movie implied that torture and the efforts of one CIA agent led to the killing of UBL.
When senior Caroline Keller asked about possible ambiguity in the film surrounding the notion that the film implies that enhanced interrogation was key, the panel could not offer her an answer.
This discussion focused more on educating the masses about how the United States government really used enhanced interrogation techniques. While this is interesting and important, it was not what was expected.
Click here to view the video from the Zero Dark Thirty panel.
– Taylor Michael, Co-Photography Editor
