Standard Operating Procedure

Is it possible for a photograph to change the world? Photographs taken by soldiers in Abu Ghraib prison changed the war in Iraq and changed America’s image of itself. Yet, a central mystery remains. Did the notorious Abu Ghraib photographs constitute evidence of systematic abuse by the American military, or were they documenting the aberrant behavior of a few “bad apples”?

We set out to examine the context of these photographs. Why were they taken? What was happening outside the frame? We talked directly to the soldiers who took the photographs and who were in the photographs. Who are these people? What were they thinking? Over two years of investigation, we amassed a million and a half words of interview transcript, thousands of pages of unredacted reports, and hundreds of photographs. The story of Abu Ghraib is still shrouded in moral ambiguity, but it is clear what happened there.

The Abu Ghraib photographs serve as both an expose and a coverup. An expose, because the photographs offer us a glimpse of the horror of Abu Ghraib; and a coverup because they convinced journalists and readers they had seen everything, that there was no need to look further. In recent news reports, we have learned about the destruction of the Abu Zubaydah interrogation tapes. A coverup. It has been front page news. But the coverup at Abu Ghraib involved thousands of prisoners and hundreds of soldiers. We are still learning about the extent of it.

Many journalists have asked about “the smoking gun” of Abu Ghraib. It is the wrong question. As Philip Gourevitch has commented, Abu Ghraib is the smoking gun. The underlying question that we still have not resolved, four years after the scandal: how could American values become so compromised that Abu Ghraib—and the subsequent coverup—could happen?

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Release Date: April 25, 2008
Genre: Documentary
Running Time: 116 min.
Distributor(s): Sony Pictures Classics
Tagline: The War on Terror will be photographed
MPAA Rating: R for disturbing images and content involving torture and graphic nudity, and for language.

Director(s):
Errol Morris

Writer(s):
Errol Morris - Screenplay

Producer(s):
Jeff Skoll - Executive Producer
Diane Weyermann - Executive Producer
Julia Sheehan - Executive Producer
Robert Fernandez - Executive Producer
Julie Ahlberg - Producer
Errol Morris - Producer

Movie Casts:
Christopher Bradley - MP Frost
Sarah Denning - M.P. Harman
Joshua Feinman MP Elliot
Jeff L. Green - MP Cathcart
Merry Grissom - Interrogator
Roy Halo - Gus
Cyrus King - M.P. Berryhill
Daniel Novy - Frederick
Zhubin Rahbar - Manadel al-Jamadi
Shaun Russell - Military Intelligence
Combiz Shams - Iraqi Detainee