STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE is about a series of photographs that changed the world, changed the war, and changed America's image of itself. A hundred years from now, these photographs in all likelihood will define the war in Iraq -- in particular, three iconic photographs taken by soldiers in the 372nd MP Company -- Lynndie England posing with a prisoner on a leash; the Hooded Man standing on a box with wires attached to his fingers; and the pyramid of naked prisoners. In his new film, Errol Morris shows how the photographs served as both an expose and a cover-up. An expose, because the photographs offered us a glimpse of the horror of what was happening at Abu Ghraib; but cover-up because they seduced people into thinking what they saw was an aberration limited to a few rouge soldiers on the nightshift.
Abu Ghraib was a dangerous, disordered place. Understaffed, undersupplied, under unremitting mortar attack, but nonetheless, it was no accident that these abuses happened. The film explores the context of these photographs. The story of the photographs. Why were they taken? What was happening outside the frame? Everybody knew about the photographs but no one knew what the photographs were about. Morris' goal here was to talk to the soldiers who took the photographs and who were in the photographs -- to understand the photographs and the people who took them.
Finally, the film is about a group of young people sent to war. As such, it is a war story, a story of a cover-up, and a story of how a small group of lowly soldiers were blamed for policy decisions and a war out of control. Abu Ghraib was a world in which almost no one was trained for the tasks they were asked to perform, where everyone knew what was going on, and where no one wanted to blow the whistle. A world in which the rules were torn up, a world in which law was redefined as lawlessness. Morris says "My last film, 'The Fog of War,' was about a person that was at the apex of power, Robert McNamara. With this new one, I wanted to make a film about the people at the bottom of the pyramid, 'the little guys.' A story that I think the world needs to see and hear."
Sony Pictures Classics In association with Participant Productions presents an Errol Morris film, STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE. Original music by Danny Elfman. Production Design by Steve Hardie. The Editors on the picture were Andy Grieve, Daniel Mooney and Steven Hathaway. The Directors of Photography were Robert Chappell & Robert Richardson, ASC. The film's Executive Producers are Jeff Skoll, Diane Weyermann, Martin Levin, Julia Sheehan, Robert Fernandez. Produced by Julie Bilson Ahlberg and Errol Morris.
***Winner of the Silver Bear Award at the 2008 Berlin International Film Festival, Sony Pictures Classics will open the picture theatrically in select U.S. cities on April 25th and nationally throughout May. In addition, a book by Philip Gourevitch and Errol Morris will be published by Penguin with the release of the film later this Spring.
Opens April 25h. Rated R. 118 minutes. In English Language.
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