Presents STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE A film by Errol Morris (117 mins, USA, 2008) Distribution Publicity Bonne Smith 1028 Queen Street West Star PR Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M6J 1H6 Tel: 416-488-4436 Tel: 416-516-9775 Fax: 416-516-0651 Fax: 416-488-8438 E-mail:
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[email protected] www.mongrelmedia.com High res stills may be downloaded from http://www.mongrelmedia.com/press.html 2 STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE Sony Pictures Classics and Participant Productions Present An Errol Morris Film Music by Danny Elfman, Production Designer, Steve Hardie, Edited by Andy Grieve, Steven Hathaway, and Dan Mooney Directors of Photography, Robert Chappell & Robert Richardson, ASC Executive Producers, Jeff Skoll, Diane Weyermann, Martin Levin, Julia Sheehan, and Robert Fernandez Produced by Julie Bilson Ahlberg Produced & Directed by Errol Morris 3 STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE Director’s Statement 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.