 Below are featured reviews, excerpts, articles and various stories on or related to Uncovered: The War on Iraq. Press documents such as the film's transcript, poster, press kit and images are also available.
By Terry Lawson |
September 10, 2004 |
"It goes without saying that the presidential election is fought and won in the media, primarily in its visual vanguard. So far nobody has claimed that the result of Bush-Kerry depends on how they fare in some newspaper interview.
In fact, the only time the candidates or parties can seriously address the issues are during conventions or debates -- and they usually balk at doing so for fear of alienating voters who might disagree with them. Better to just praise our boys in the military and the character of the American people, call your opponent a sissy or a puppet and be done with it.
So this year, if you want to hear a real political argument you have to pay for it at the video store or, of all places, at the movies. The speaker's platform this week is given to "Uncovered: The War on Iraq," an extended version of a DVD/VHS of the same name that has done brisk business in the past six months.
Unlike the biggest-grossing propaganda film in history ("Fahrenheit 9/11" if you don't count "The Passion of the Christ"), "Uncovered" engages neither in smirking, character assassination nor innuendo. Director Robert Greenwald -- who also made "Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism," which opened the national debate on the political bias of Fox News -- takes a relatively high road in "Uncovered."
It goes without saying that the presidential election is fought and won in the media, primarily in its visual vanguard. So far nobody has claimed that the result of Bush-Kerry depends on how they fare in some newspaper interview.
In fact, the only time the candidates or parties can seriously address the issues are during conventions or debates -- and they usually balk at doing so for fear of alienating voters who might disagree with them. Better to just praise our boys in the military and the character of the American people, call your opponent a sissy or a puppet and be done with it.
So this year, if you want to hear a real political argument you have to pay for it at the video store or, of all places, at the movies. The speaker's platform this week is given to "Uncovered: The War on Iraq," an extended version of a DVD/VHS of the same name that has done brisk business in the past six months.
Unlike the biggest-grossing propaganda film in history ("Fahrenheit 9/11" if you don't count "The Passion of the Christ"), "Uncovered" engages neither in smirking, character assassination nor innuendo. Director Robert Greenwald -- who also made "Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism," which opened the national debate on the political bias of Fox News -- takes a relatively high road in "Uncovered."
Using nothing but the (often contradictory) public pronouncements of the Bush administration, he presents its stated case for declaring war on Iraq and its defense of how and why it has been waged. Then he rebuts them point by point with the testimony of defense and national security analysts, former members of the intelligence community, diplomats and others who strongly disagree with the purpose, strategy and the conduct of the war.
The critics include many of the usual suspects: Former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, who exposed the yellow cake uranium receipt as a forgery, and former administration member Richard Clarke, who argued against the invasion, made the same points in Michael Moore's movie. The most convincing arguments, however, tend to come from whistle-blowers such as former career CIA analyst Ray McGovern. He dissects the objectives and execution of Secretary of State Colin Powell's speech to the United Nations, saying it used discredited intelligence to make the case for war. McGovern concludes it was the American hero's worst hour.
"Uncovered" contains no off-screen narration to navigate us through the jammed-up information highway, nor does it address the motivations behind any of the testimony. We do hear weapons inspector Scott Ritter say that while he's a registered Republican who voted for George W. Bush, he would not let that impact his mission or his conclusion that Saddam Hussein's chemical weapon program was dismantled and the nuclear weapons program was a nonstarter.
More convincing is the newsreel odyssey of David Kay, who obviously arrives in Iraq fairly confident hidden weapons of mass destruction will be located, and goes home believing, almost apologetically, there were none to be found.
The criticism that will be leveled at a film that, like Moore's, primarily assembles evidence an educated citizen should already know, is that Greenwald has not invited any of the Bush administration's defenders and talk-show foot soldiers to refute the witnesses. Instead, he lets Rumsfeld, Cheney, Rice and Tenant speak for themselves.
He does not, however, use them as whipping boys or reduce them to comic figures. (Although Rumsfeld's defensiveness as he emphatically denies leading the public to believe that Iraq had nuclear weapon capability should give pause to anyone who doesn't want to parse what the meaning of "it" is.)
"Uncovered" has no interest in explaining the Bush administration's case for war for them: This is the prosecution's argument, and it is extremely well-made."
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