Film and ‘Islamic terrorism’
Anneriken Wehrens ‐ 0255009
RMA Media Studies
Utrecht University 2009
Supervisor: Vincent Crone Foreword
I would like to thank my supervisor Vincent Crone for his efforts and cooperation. I also want to thank Nanna Verhoeff for being my second reader, but also for her support as my tutor and friend. Of course, I could not have done it without the never ending support of my parents, now and during my whole studies. Many thanks to my sisters Maike and Femke as well as to my friends. Thank you Jirsi for all your positive energy.
2 Contents
Introduction The ‘Islamic Other’ 5 Defining terrorism 9
Methodology and theoretical framework Audiovisual analysis and discourse analysis as interrelated 12 Materials: three Western critiques 13 Reception of the films: the reality of torture 14 Segmentation and filmic narratives 18 The (re)presentation of terrorism and beyond 20 Binary narratives 22 Islamic terrorism as a discourse 24 The binary categorization of terrorism and practices of ‘outcasting’ 26 Problemising the discursive categories 27 ‘Cultural semiotics’ and ‘contingency’ 29 Discourse and the metaphor of the ‘rhizome’ 31
Theorizing the image: analysis Segmentation, narratives and themes 34 Actors within the narratives 36 Filmic narratives in perspective 38 The discursive contextuality and outcasting: Bush versus the detainee 39 The filmic narrative; cultural translation and identification 40 The face of terrorism 41 Constructing filmic narrative: metatext 42 Discourse as a rhizome 44 Creating an alternative 47
3 Conclusion From a distance 50 Theoretical implications 52 ‘Meta‐discursive' practices 54
Bibliography 56
Attachments
1 Segmentation THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO 61
2 Segmentation TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE 70
3 Segmentation THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES 84
4 Story outline THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO 93
5 Story outline TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE 97
6 Story outline THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES 101 7 Analysis of actors within the narratives 104
4 Introduction
The ‘Islamic Other’
Because of the events of 9/11, the Muslim world has become the centre of attention while it became associated with radical fundamentalist Muslims and terrorism. The media play an important role in this as they function to portray the ‘Islamic other’ and in this sense, serve as discursive spaces in which knowledge about the Islam is produced and mediated. In this respect, Terrorism Studies scholar Richard Jackson notes that;
“(…) the terrorism discourse – the terms, assumptions, labels, categories and narratives used to describe and explain terrorism – has emerged as one of the most important political discourses of the modern era (…). As a term of elite and popular discourse, terrorism has come to possess clearly observable ideographic qualities. That is, like 'freedom', 'democracy' and 'justice', 'terrorism' now functions as a primary term for the central narratives of the culture, employed in political debate and daily conversation, but largely unquestioned in its meaning and usage.”1
Jackson’s quote stresses the subtle integration of a certain meaning of ‘terrorism’ in our contemporary society to define our own culture; the term ‘terrorism’ provides us with a larger narrative to interpret our own cultural state. If the terrorism discourse is indeed so important in shaping our understanding and interpretation of contemporary culture, this overall narrative needs to be questioned. Ever since 9/11, images of the airplanes crashing into the Twin Towers have been frequently portrayed by media, alongside with images of Osama Bin Laden, Bush declaring the ‘war against terror,’ Arab fighters whose faces are covered up in scarves while holding guns, men with beards and turbans in long
1 Richard Jackson, “Constructing Enemies: ‘Islamic Terrorism’ in Political and Academic Discourse,” Government and Opposition 42 (2007): 394.
5 dresses and military troops moving through dusty sandy landscapes. This way, these images have ‘codified’ our perceptions of the terrorist threat. Several films and series have been produced that portray narratives of terrorism; be it either documentary or fiction, they all position themselves within the theme of the terrorist threat related to the Muslim world in specific.
On the one hand, there are films and television series like THE AGE OF
TERROR (Jon Blair, 2002), 9/11 (2002), THE VOICE OF THE PROPHET (Robert Edwards,
2002), WTC THE FIRST 24 HOURS (Etienne Sauret, 2002), DC 9/11: TIME OF CRISIS
(Brian Trenchard‐Smith, 2003), WORLD TRADE CENTER (Oliver Stone, 2006) and
UNITED 93 (Paul Greengrass, 2006), which all tell the story from the perspective of the Westerners as being the victims. These films heavily draw upon the distinction between ‘the West’ and the Middle East, meaning the ‘Muslim world.’2 This distinction, which we find not only in films and television series, but in Western news media too, is reinforced by these film and television productions, and in that way contribute to the further polarization of the West on the one side and the Middle East, or Muslim world, at the other side. However, there are also films that tell the story from another perspective; both the fiction film THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO (Mat Whitecross and Michael Winterbottom, 2006), which bases itself on the actual story of the famous ‘Tipton
Three’, and the documentary TAXI TO THE DARKSIDE (Alex Gibney, 2007) portray the suspected terrorists as the victims, while BBC documentary THE POWER OF
NIGHTMARES (Adam Curtis, 2004), comments on the construction of fear for terrorism by our own political leaders. In this sense, all three films convey what we might call a ‘counter‐narrative’; they are critical evaluations of the dominant discourse of terrorism and its mediation. In the current academic debate on terrorism there is a sharp division between, one the one hand, the Middle East, which is heavily associated with the Islam, and on the other hand, the West, which involves Europe and America in particular. Commenting on our current cultural state philosopher Hans Koechler, who is concerned with trans‐cultural understanding and the relations between
2 For further reading on the attitude of the West towards the (Middle) East and the false assumptions about the oriental ‘Other,’ see Edward Said, Orientalism (London: Routledge, 1978).
6 the Islam and the West in specific, writes:
“The present ‘‘New World Order’’ is characterized by an unequal power balance that results, as far as the socio‐cultural consequences are concerned, in an increasing alienation between the Western‐industrialized and the developing world. The undeniable tensions between the Western and Muslim world are a vivid expression of this imbalance. This situation creates feelings of being threatened on both sides of the cultural or civilizational divide: there exists fear for the preservation of one’s identity and independence on the one side, and fear for the loss of one’s dominant role and the preservation of one’s way of life, system of values, etc. on the other side. It is exactly here where the stereotype of a threat supposedly emanating from the respective ‘‘other’’ civilization comes into play.”3
According to Koechler, the threat of our identity comes from the ‘other’ civilization, which is in this case the ‘Muslim world.’ This is in line with European ethnologist Wolfgang Kaschuba. Kaschuba doesn’t directly refer to the other as being Muslim, but does note that;
“The difference between, the distance from and the contrast to the Other seem to be the most important qualities of collective feelings and identities in a context where they are confronted by strange and threatening external worlds, brought ever closer by images of worldwide migration and crisis.”4
So the current sharp division of the Middle East and the West seems to stem from a major threat of the ‘Other.’ It is important to understand that this threat of the ‘distant Other’ is getting near by because of the images that are presented to us. The ‘Other’ is getting 'closer,' because of its frequent portrayal
3 Hans Koechler, “The dialogue of civilizations: Philosophical basis, current state and prospects,” Asia Europe Journal 1 (2003): 319. 4 Wolfgang Kaschuba, “The Emergence and Transformation of Foundation Myths,” in Myth and Memory in the Construction of Community. Historical Patterns in Europe and Beyond, ed. Bo Strath (Brussels: P.I.E. Lang, 2000), 221.
7 on television and films.5 This way, the ‘Other’ becomes integrated in our daily lives and the ‘threat’ becomes more ‘real.’ Therefore, it is important to study how the Other is ‘brought closer’ to us by media, so how the Other is presented, and the way these media contribute to the debate on terrorism. Scholars within the field of Media Studies in particular, have mainly studied terrorism by focusing on the role and effect of mass media coverage on terrorism.6 These studies all seem to confirm the binary division between the Western world on the one hand and the Islamic world on the other hand. While acknowledging the dichotomy of the Middle East versus the West, with this thesis I aim to study this dichotomy and explore the boundaries in between. I want to move away from using rigid concepts such as ‘the West’ and ‘Middle East’. Instead, I mean to mobilise them, creating a space for debate and negotiation of meanings that are inherent to the temporary Islamic terrorism discourse. Using the metaphor of the 'rhizome' I will suggest we think of the Middle East and West as 'rhizomatic,' or 'next to each other,' rather than as opposites in a hierarchy.7 On a more general level then, I hope to contribute to
5 That the 'Other' is 'getting closer' means here that the 'Other' becomes 'present' in our daily lives, rather than that it becomes truly 'known' to us. It's just a presentation we encounter, rather then learning about the 'true' nature of the 'Other.' 6 Norris, Pepita, Montague Kern and Marion Just, Framing Terrorism. The News Media, the Government and the Public (London and New York: Routledge, 2003). Philip Schlesinger, Graham Murdock and Philip Elliott, Televising "terrorism": political violence in popular culture (London and New York: Comedia Pub. Group, 1983); A. Odasuo Alali and Kelvin Eke, eds., Media Coverage of Terrorism: Methods of Diffusion (London and New Delhi: Sage, 1991); Yonah Alexander and Robert G. Picard, eds., In the camera's eye: News coverage of terrorist events (Washington: Brassey's, 1991); Bethami A. Dobkin, Tales of Terror: Television News and the Construction of the Terrorist Threat (New York: Praeger, 1992); Richard W. Schaffert, Media Coverage and Political Terrorists: A Quantitative Analysis (New York: Praeger, 1992); Gabriel Weimann and Conrad Winn, The Theater of Terror: Mass Media and International Terrorists (New York: Longman, 1994); David L. Paletz and Alex Peter Schmid, eds., Terrorism and the Media (Newbury Park, California: Sage, 1991); Brigitte L. Nacos, MassMediated Terrorism. The Central Role of the Media in Terrorism and Counterterrorism (London: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2002). 7 The philosophical concept of the rhizome is developed by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari in their project Capitalism and Schizophrenia (1972‐1980). See specifically: Gilles Deleuze and Felix
8 the opening up of the broader cultural debate regarding the place of the Islam within our present day culture. In this research, I draw on the exact polarization of the West and the Middle East as portrayed and reinforced by news media in terms of ‘good versus evil’ and ‘modernization versus the Islam’.8 Focusing on three films ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARKSIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, I will argue that these films can be perceived as a counterbalance to the image of the Islam and terrorism as presented by news media, and yet, these films draw upon the same discursive practices as the dominant terrorism discourse, which is largely constructed by these news media. This practice of drawing upon the same dichotomy that it tries to deconstruct or nuance, is rather double and seems a contradiction in itself. Is causes a tension, a certain cultural dynamic that provides an interesting case for further investigation. The central question of this thesis is then: how do the films THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARKSIDE and
THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES contribute to a shift in knowledge production about the Islam, as well as how do these films relate to the dominant terrorism discourse?9
Defining terrorism
Terrorism has become part of our daily lives, which is illustrated in Jackson’s quote at the beginning of this thesis. Just like he says, ‘terrorism’ is frequently referred to by people and media, but because it has become so common in our contemporary culture, its meaning has become multiple and vague. Therefore, it
Guattari , A Thousand Plateaus, trans. Brian Massumi (London and New York: Continuum, 2004). I will elaborate upon the metaphor of the rhizome later on. 8 Jackson, 401. 9 Due to the September 11 attacks, the Middle Eastern discourse has become intertwined with the current terrorism discourse, which involves frequent (re)presentation of the Muslim culture. This way, it is difficult to see the Middle Eastern discourse as completely separate from the terrorism discourse; the Middle Eastern discourse has become an important part of the terrorism discourse. Therefore, I refer to the dominant terrorism discourse as heavily associated with the Middle East, rather than that I use the term ‘Middle Eastern’ discourse.
9 is first necessary to understand what ‘terrorism’ actually means, or at least, how the term is used in this thesis. ‘Terrorism’ itself is hard to define as it is multiple and fluid and can have several meanings. It is emotional as well as physical, but also spiritual. It can be linked to intimidation, violence and fear; fear that partly stems from the impossibility to grasp what terrorism is. Pepita Norris, Montague Kern and Marion Just note that the concept of terrorism is “essentially contested, value‐ laden, and open to multiple meanings located within broader cultural frames, so that, to some extent, terrorism is in the eye of the beholder.”10 Eventually, Norris, Kern and Marion define terrorism as “the systematic use of coercive intimidation against civilians for political goals.”11 Here, terrorism is defined as a political act. It is political in that it is an act against certain groups, but we can also think of it as political because it plays an important role in the construction of identities; friends and enemies, good versus evil, the middle East versus the West. It is this political element of terrorism and its polarizing practices of identities that I will focus on specifically. Still, this leaves us with a rather broad definition of terrorism. Therefore, I confine myself to the notion of ‘Islamic terrorism’ as used by Jackson. Islamic terrorism limits itself to terrorism activities related to Islamic fundamentalism in specific, as there are many other forms of terrorism. Jackson points out that ‘Islamic terrorism’ is not new, but rather “has a long history and is already deeply embedded in the broader cultural, institutional and discursive structures of Western society.”12 However, the way we define terrorism is not the only concern for this research. The use of concepts such as ‘the West’ and ‘the Middle‐East,’ also requires further examination. It’s important to note that these are cultural (discursive) constructions based on categorization and stereotyping; they have a common meaning to us, which allows us to talk about these different parts of the
10 Norris, Pepita, Montague Kern and Marion Just, Framing Terrorism. The News Media, the Government and the Public (London and New York: Routledge, 2003), 6. 11 Norris, Kern and Just, 6. 12 Jackson, 397.
10 world on the same level. The difficulty then for this research, which aims to expose these terms as being cultural constructions, is that I am dependent on them and their common meaning; whenever I use such terms as East or West, I’m using these exact cultural constructions that I’m trying to expose here; I’m depending on what is already established in order to nuance the image we have of the Middle East. Ultimately, in this thesis I want to create a better understanding of the issue of terrorism related to the Islam. Therefore, this research offers a reinterpretation of the constructs of the Middle East and Islamic culture for or world, the cultural construction we live in that we call ‘the West.’
11 Methodology and theoretical framework
Audiovisual analysis and discourse analysis as interrelated
Through an audiovisual analysis, which is interrelated with a discourse analysis.
I will explore the question of how do the films ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE
DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES contribute to a shift in knowledge production about the Islam and how do they relate to the dominant terrorism discourse? This means I will pay attention to pre‐established narrative structures, which stem from the dominant terrorism discourse, in relation to the ‘filmic’ narrative strands and how their interrelation contributes to the symbolic power of the images and of these films as a whole.13 Not only does the combination of methodologies allow me to give a much broader and detailed account of the way these films deploy the discursive narratives of terrorism, but more importantly, the audiovisual and the discursive cannot be seen as separate, but function as intertwined; central to my audiovisual analysis of the films will be the existing discursive narrative structures of Islamic terrorism in it and how, through the semioticity or the interaction of certain audiovisual signs, an alternative narrative is created.14 This way the overall function of my audiovisual analysis is to give insight into the way the dominant discourse on Islamic terrorism is contested. Eventually then, I will
13 I use the terms ‘discursive narrative’ and ‘filmic narrative’ to differ between the narratives that stem from the dominant discourse and the narrative that is created throughout the film. It’s important to note however, that this filmic narrative is discursive too, since it offers us a narrative framework for our interpretations as well. Only this framework stems from the events within the film story and not necessarily from the larger framework that is offered by the dominant discourse on Islamic terrorism. Even though I distinguish the filmic narrative form the discursive narrative, I want to stress their interrelationship and interdependency. These narrative constructions are intertwined and can’t be perceived of as separate. 14 Though 'semioticity' is a not so common term, it can be used as referring to 'semiotic practices.' Literary scholar Renate Lachmann also uses 'semioticity,' see “Counter‐memory and Phantasma,” Arcadia International Journal for Literary Studies 39 (2004): 291‐300.
12 propose what I would like to call a ‘meta‐discursive’ practice in which the filmic narrative is used to comment on the discursive narrative, while simultaneously, the filmic narrative is part of the discursive narrative it comments on.
Materials: three Western critiques
I have selected the films ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE
POWER OF NIGHTMARES as case studies, because they are similar in that they all draw heavily, if not fully, on the documentary form and style, but more importantly, these films have in common their critical and interrogating character. Before going further into the methodology, I would like to address the character of these films and the way they were received by the audience. Providing such a background helps to get a better understanding of their cultural context, which is important if we want to understand them as 'counterbalancing' the dominant terrorism discourse.
While THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO is a re‐enacted documentary, which mixes fictitious scenes with documentary scenes, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE is a documentary about Dilawar, a young Afghan taxi driver who got captured by the Americans and tortured to death in the prison camp of Bagram. Through Dilawar’s story the film investigates the U.S. practices and treatment of their captives. The film criticizes the Bush administration for its lack of clear guidance and rules for the soldiers, who eventually had to take all the blame as Bush cleared himself and his government from complaints against his administration, which might lead to prosecution. THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES describes the current terrorism threat as a myth created by politicians to gain more power. It consists of three parts, of which I will only analyze the third part THE SHADOWS IN THE CAVE, as it deals specifically with the issue of Islamic terrorism as we know it today. Since these films all ‘interrogate’ the issue of terrorism, we can say that these three films are part of a larger, what I would like to call ‘9/11 aftermath terrorist‐film corpus.’ These films then, stem from a broader societal discomfort and disagreement about the way the issue of terrorism is represented and dealt with in contemporary society.
13 What’s even more typical about these films is that they are produced by the West. They’re more than just ‘terrorist films’; they’re Western critiques, which deal with the issue of terrorism in a way that challenges our dominant views and beliefs, rather than confirming them. What place then do these films have in our contemporary culture and how do they relate to the dominant views, or ‘terrorism discourse’? Should we think of these films as ‘counter’ or can we perceive of them as being part of the same discursive practices as the dominant discourse that polarizes the West and the Middle East? Approaching THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES as ‘alternative’ to the terrorism discourse it is interesting to address the way they were received and if they indeed were thought of as ‘alternative’ when they were released.
Reception of the films: the reality of torture
When the films were released, they all received international praise for their controversial character. TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE won among others an Oscar for
Best Documentary Feature in 2008, THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO won a BAFTA Award and the prestigious Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival 2006 for Best
Director. THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES won the BAFTA Television, Royal Television Society and Broadcasting Press Guild awards for best documentary series. The films roused discussion and became part of the larger debate about the practices of torture worldwide and, more specific, about torture methods condoned by the Bush administration in ‘the war on terrorism.’ Though these films were screened and broadcasted without any problems in Europe, in America their release was more problematic, especially for THE
POWER OF NIGHTMARES. This three‐part series was broadcasted in three consecutive weeks on BBC 2 in 2004 and featured at the Cannes film festival in 2005. It was even shown on al‐Jazeera.15 The series has been distributed worldwide by Pathé, that is, outside the U.S. Other than at a some major film
15 http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2005/may/12/cannes2005.cannesfilmfestival4 accessed, 22‐07‐2009.
14 festivals, THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES has not been shown in the U.S. since American broadcasters rejected the series.16 Nevertheless, the film had a short theatrical run in New York City during 2005.17
The main critique on THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES was its description as being anti‐American or a "conspiracy theory." David Asman of FoxNews.com stated; "We wish we didn't have to keep presenting examples of how the European media have become obsessively anti‐American. But they keep pushing the barrier, now to the point of absurdity."18 Curtis, the writer and director of the series responded to accusations of creating a conspiracy theory saying that he believes that the alleged use of fear as a force in politics is not the result of a conspiracy but rather the subjects of the film "have stumbled on it".19
With regard to THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, the American press was rather positive and the film received good reviews in THE NEW YORK TIMES and NEW YORK
MAGAZINE. THE NATION expressed its admiration for THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO as well and hoped “millions of people will see it,” but at the same time, the review questioned the film’s use of “the always dubious techniques of docudrama” and criticized the film for telling the main characters’ stories without properly verifying their claims.20 This critique was not new as other, European media too, commented on the rather biased character of the film.
The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) gave THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO an R‐rating for language and disturbing violent content. The real issue however, was the poster, which was rejected for advertising purposes as it was rated an ‘F.’ The original poster, which shows a man hanging in cuffs while
16 http://www.rinf.com/news/sep‐2005/06.html, accessed 22‐07‐2009.
17 THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES was screened at the True/False Film Festival in Columbia, Missouri, and has also been featured at the 2006 Seattle International Film Festival, the San Francisco International Film Festival and the Tribeca Film Festival in New York. 18 Asman, David (20‐10‐2004). "Anti‐American Europeans". FoxNews.com (Fox News). http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,136089,00.html, Retrieved on ‐12‐06‐2007. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,136089,00.html, accessed 22‐07‐2009. 19 Ibid. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/4202741.stm, accessed 22‐07‐2009. 20 http://www.roadtoguantanamomovie.com/reviews/nation/nation_01.html, accessed 22‐07‐ 2009.
15 wearing a hood (fig. 5.1) had to be censored. The American distributor of the film Roadside Attractions, responded by asking the MPAA to reconsider their decision, arguing that “because it dealt with serious issues in the real world of the war on terror, the standard for the poster should reflect a greater tolerance for the troubling nature of the material.”21 The MPAA however, declined the request and the poster was changed, showing now only the arms of a man hanging in cuffs (fig. 5.2). The MPAA then finally approved of the poster. The commotion about the poster shows that the portrayal of torture was and still is, a delicate matter within the U.S., especially after some pictures of Abu Ghraib got out in the press in 2004.22
Fig. 5.1 Fig. 5.2
Though some perceived of THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO as ‘anti‐American,’ in
21 http://www.roadtoguantanamomovie.com/reviews/washington_post/wp_5‐17‐06.html, accessed 22‐07‐2009. 22 Up till today, these images have not been approved for release within the United States, while outside America they are freely distributed.
16 an interview with the Washinton Post, director Michael Winterbottom stated:
"The Road to Guantanamo" was not anti‐American. It was showing what happened to three British guys in Guantanamo. I think Guantanamo is wrong. I don't think "Guantanamo" should exist. That doesn't make me anti‐American. Lots of Americans think it's wrong as well.”23
Still, the film was heavily criticized on U.S.television; “Winterbottom himself was treated like a pariah on US cable news shows, with mendacious Pentagon spokesmen trotted out to defame his movie.”24 The film eventually had a limited theatrical release in America and was not shown on U.S. television.
TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE also encountered some problems within the United
States. Just like THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO the film got rated an ‘R’ for disturbing images and content involving torture and graphic nudity. The film premiered in 2007 at the Tribeca Film Festival. After that it has been screened in cinemas across the United States. Just before its US network premiere, Discovery Channel came to an agreement with director Alex Gibney to buy the TV rights. Nevertheless, shortly after that, Discovery Channel cancelled the deal because the film would be ‘too controversial’ since its depiction of real acts perpetrated by the Bush administration. Gibney noted in an interview with the Center for American Progress, that Americans didn’t mind the dramatizations of torture in a popular show like “24,” but were uncomfortable “with the reality of torture.”25 Overall, the films were received with ambiguity, but that’s probably what caused their international success. Their controversy stems from the alternative they offer to the dominant terrorism discourse; the make different use of images that have been ‘codified’ in their perception since September 11, which forces us to look beyond the boundaries of the images as such. Though the debate about the films have been mostly constructed by liberal leftist critiques and right wing
23 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp‐ dyn/content/discussion/2007/06/12/DI2007061200562.html, accessed 22‐07‐2009. 24 http://www.truthout.org/article/iraq‐sale‐as‐not‐seen‐tv, accessed 22‐07‐2009. 25 http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2008/02/gibney_interview.html, accessed 22‐07‐ 2009.
17 conservatives, in the end what matters is the fact that these films have initiated a dialogue about terrorism and torture, or like Alex Gibney, director of TAXI TO THE
DARK SIDE puts it: “it’s not about left or right, it’s about right and wrong.”26
Segmentation and filmic narratives
Now that we have located the films within a broader cultural framework we have a better insight in the background of the films, which owe their value to their specific contemporary context. To be able to answer how these films contribute to a shift in Islamic knowledge production as well as how they relate to the dominant terrorism discourse, I first distinguish in my analysis a specific semioticity of these films; what signs or ‘indices’ do we see in these films, which images reoccur? For my analysis I have segmented the opening sequences of the three films.27 I particularly selected these sequences because they are crucial for the film’s overall atmosphere as in the first fifteen minutes the film’s context is created: the audience is introduced to the film’s characters, their situation and the setting of the story. For my segmentation I used a schedule which involves the duration of the segment; kernel and catalyse (kernels are the essential elements which are crucial to the progress of the story, catalyse is what adds to the atmosphere); the location; the characters; comments on sound, editing, camerawork or mise‐en‐ scene and, finally, a separate colon for the ‘indice,’ or ‘indication,’ which are specific images or objects that (might) have heightened meaning.28 Such a segmentation provides a good overview of the scenes, plus it helps to zoom in on the specificity of the scene, i.e. its style, editing, the construction of the narrative, the interaction between sound and image and the specific icons being used,
26 http://www.taxitothedarkside.com, accesses 22‐07‐2009. 27 The approach I’m using is mainly semiotic. However, it is also important to pay attention to narrative strategies since he meaning of the actors stems mostly from their context. That’s why I will also take elements like editing and vocabulary into account, because they are essential for constructing the narrative(s) that the actors are embedded in. 28 The segmentation is enclosed.
18 which, when placed in the context of the story, have an explicit meaning and become of more importance. In addition the opening sequences, I also selected another crucial sequence in each film. This because, as I will argue, in the course of each film the semioticity, or meaning of each indice changes. To gain inside in this semiotic process it’s necessary to look at the development of the film story and not just at its opening sequences. The second sequence I will analyze in THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO, shows the boys as detainees in Guantanamo Bay (0:53:16 – 1:02:50). I choose this sequence because it’s the opposite of the beginning; whereas at the start of the film the boys are free and careless, at this sequence they’re suspected terrorists and they’re being held into a strict prison camp at Guantanamo Bay.
Besides the opening sequence of TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE (0:00:00 – 0:07:30), I will also analyze its final sequence (1:31:05 – 1:42:21). It is especially in these last ten minutes, that some key comments are made and we return to the main character of Dilawar, the taxi driver. The second sequence that I selected from
THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, is from the second half of the film (0:40:33 – 0:46:10). I choose this sequence because here the film specifically centers on the media and its key role in the creation of an evil Middle Eastern phantom. This is interesting because the film is a medium as well. More importantly however, is that the sequences I selected in addition to the opening sequences, are all foregro unding the binary relation between the Middle East and the West, which is why they are critical sequences for this thesis. Based on the segmentation schedule then, I will provide an outline of the opening sequence of each film, as well as its second sequence that I selected. Consequently, I will pay attention to the variety of indices; reoccurring images that help to set the story. In this sense these indices function as ‘actors’ since they ‘act’ to produce the symbolic meaning of the film. These indices then, I will discuss as being located within the narrative of the film, as on their own, they’re just signs; it’s only when they’re part of a broader context that a more particular meaning is constructed. Consequently I distinguish several sub‐narratives, which are all connected to certain themes. These sub‐narratives and their themes are all
19 embedded within a wider ‘threat' narrative and its related theme of ‘the role of the media.’ Differentiating the narrative strands provides us with a better insight of how these films are constructed, and more specifically, how the actors function to contribute to the symbolic meaning within these films.
The (re)presentation of terrorism and beyond
For my audiovisual analysis, I adopt a semiotic approach, looking specifically at the ‘semiotics of culture.’ When addressing the issue of the news media and their mediation of the Islam connected to terrorism, it’s remarkable that much of the research done in this area, focuses on the ‘frames’, and the intertextuality among the reports.29 Such research focuses on the language uttered while citing the Bush administration, or looks at the frequency and rates of news items and the growing attention for terrorist issues. Less research has been done on the specific iconology, a certain ‘semiotics of terrorism’ as we might call it. With this
29 Naama Nagar, "Frames that Don't Spill: The News Media and the "War on Terrorism"" (paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Studies Association 48th Annual Convent ion, Chicago, USA, February 28, 2007). See also: David Domke, God Willing? Political Fundamentalism in the White House, the "War on Terror," and the Echoing Press. (London: ML Pluto Press, 2004). Elizabeth W. Dunn, Moriah Moore and Brian A. Nosek, “The war of the words: how linguistic differences in reporting shape perceptions of terrorism,” Analyses of social issues and public policy 5 (2005): 67‐86. Robert Entman, “Cascading activation: Contesting the White House's frame after 9/11,” Political Communication 20 (2003): 415‐432. Nel Ruigrok and Wouter van Atteveldt, “Global angling with a local angle: How U.S., British, and Dutch newspapers frame global and local terrorist attacks,” The Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics 12 (2007): 68‐90. Michael Ryan, “Framing the war against terrorism: U.S. newspaper editorials and military action in Afghanistan,” Gazette: International Journal for Communication Studies 66 (2004): 363‐382. Christian Spielvogel, "You know where I stand": Moral framing of the war on terrorism and the Iraq War in the 2004 presidential campaign,” Rhetoric & Public Affairs 8 (2005): 549‐569. Amy Gershkoff and Shana Kushner, “Shaping public opinion: The 9/11‐Iraq connection in the Bush administration’s rhetoric,” Perspectives on Politics 3 (2005): 525‐537.
20 thesis, I hope to fill that gap to a certain level. In my analysis I will use the approach of cultural semiotics as explained by literary scholar Renate Lachmann, who bases herself on semiotician Juri Lotman;
“[Cultural semiotics] operates with an inventory of categories and concepts for the analysis of cultural processes which are meant to totally describe the techniques of self‐interpretation and self‐modelling (transformation, translation, transcoding) by means of which a culture attempts to stabilize itself. Such categories are self‐description, cultural metalanguage or metatext; cultural grammar; dynamic mechanism. To the extent a culture recognizes or denies semioticity it draws a boundary line between itself and extra‐culture, which it either defines as anti‐culture (thus having a negative semioticity) or as non‐ culture (having no semioticity whatsoever).”30
This quote is important, because it already points towards a certain approach or methodology for the analysis of cultural phenomena: that of making an inventory of the main categories and concepts which play an important part in the cultural processes through which a culture tries to stabilise, or normalise, itself. This ‘inventory’ I make in the first part of my analysis, by distinguishing indices, or actors and by dividing the narratives of the films in sub‐narratives, connecting them to their own themes. Such an inventory already provides a good overview of the kind of images that these films use to portray the issue of Islamic terrorism and moreover, how these images function as actors to ‘normalize’ our perception of terrorism as being associated with the Islam and the Middle East. However, the making of an inventory is just a preparation. To be able to answer the main question of how these films contribute to a shift in Islamic knowledge production and how they relate to the dominant terrorism discourse, we need to go beyond the question of how terrorism is (re)presented in these
30 Renate Lachmann, “Counter‐memory and Phantasma,” Arcadia International Journal for Literary Studies 39 (2004): 289. For work by Juri Lotman, see: Juri Lotman, Universe of the Mind: A Semiotic Theory of Culture, trans. Ann Shukman (London & New York: I. B. Tauris & Co, 1990).
21 films. Therefore, I will continue by deploying the idea of ‘contingency,’ which implies a ‘double contextuality’, and the practice of ‘cultural semiotics.’ The idea of contingency and its inherent double contextuality then, I use to theorise the films and provide further insight in the functioning of the actors and comment on their status and location within the overall filmic narratives as well as the terrorism discourse. At the same time, analyzing these films through these concepts, allows me to comment on the theory, hence this thesis is also a theoretical exploration of ‘contingency’ in relation to the process of ‘cultural semiotics.’
Binary narratives
Contingency deals with the creation of ‘myths’ and involves the construction of binary divisions, which I will be looking at as well in my analysis. This creation of dichotomies plays a major role in the films; the main dichotomy then, is the ‘West’ versus the ‘Middle East,’ which in a sense is a ‘mythical’ construction too. In her article ‘The Discourses of Terrorism’ discourse analyst Aditi Bhatia also focuses on binary divisions that help to construct the larger terrorism discourse as a whole.31 Bhatia differentiates between four narrative strands of ‘good versus evil;’ ‘law versus lawlessness; ‘civilization versus savageness’ and at last, she distinguishes the narrative of freedom versus tyranny. Drawing on Bhatia then, I distinguish the three filmic narratives of good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilization versus savageness’ in my analysis, as they function as important sub‐strands within these films.32 The
31 Aditi Bhatia, “The discourses of Terrorism,” Journal of Pragmatics 41 (2009): 279–289. 32 Even though Bhatia mentions a fourth narrative strand of ‘freedom versus tyranny,’ I distinguish only three narratives. Admitting that it is difficult to distinguish clear categories with fixed boundaries, it can also be argued that ‘freedom versus tyranny’ is located within the other narrative categories of ‘good versus evil’ and ‘civilization versus savageness.’ Therefore, I concentrate on the three strands of ‘good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilization versus savageness,’ also, because this helps to maintain the focus of the thesis.
22 strands of ‘good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilization versus savageness’ are exemplary for the construction of narratives of ‘power’ and ‘conflict’ that are closely related to ‘war.’ Nevertheless, the films also include subjects like ‘guilt versus innocence,’ ‘peace versus violence’ and ‘dirt versus hygiene.’ These categories however, I found less distinctive as they seem to be part of the broader strands that I have selected as being sub‐narratives. ‘Guilty versus innocent’ for example, resembles the idea of ‘law versus lawlessness’ to a large degree and ‘peace versus violence’ is similar to ‘good versus evil’ as well as to ‘civilization versus savageness.’ ‘Dirt versus hygiene’ we can consider to be part of ‘civilization versus savageness’ too. Furthermore, distinguishing filmic narratives that are similar to Bhatia’s discursive narratives provides us with an interesting comparative perspective; comparing the filmic narratives to the discursive narratives of Bhatia, I will go into the different purposes and functioning of the categorical dichotomies of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness. The sub‐narrative strands of ‘good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilization versus savageness’ within these films operate to provide us with a framework to understand the actors and contribute to their heightened meaning. Each narrative strand can be connected to a theme as well. Good versus evil is linked to the reoccurring theme of ‘light and darkness.’ Inherent to the narrative strand of law versus lawlessness is the theme of ‘human versus inhuman’ and the strand of civilization versus savageness can be connected to ‘modernity versus tradition.’ To get insight into the way the filmic narratives relate to the dominant discourse of terrorism, I will now discuss the dominant discursive narratives of Islamic terrorism. Drawing on discourse analysts Jackson and Bhatia, I pay attention to the origins of the current terrorism discourse, as well as the narratives it has produced.
23 Islamic terrorism as a discourse
Today’s discourse on Islamic terrorism has it origins in three discursive traditions. Jackson points out that first of all, the idea of ‘'Islamic terrorism' originates in the academic domain of ‘religious terrorism’, which is a sub‐field of terrorism studies.33 Secondly, the Islamic terrorism discourse is rooted in the Orientalist tradition. Jackson states that “(…) the discourse derives a great many of its core assumptions, labels and narratives from the long tradition and archive of Orientalist scholarship on the Middle East and Arab culture and religion.”34 Furthermore, Jackson explains that due to the political tumult and happenings in the Middle East during the 1970’s and 1980’s, there was a big increase in oriental literature, which came to expand even more after the 9/11 attacks and the ‘war on terrorism’ that followed.35 The third discursive tradition of ‘Islamic terrorism,’ is the most essential one for this thesis, since it is specifically media related. This media‐tradition is founded on cultural stereotypes that are commonly used by media. Jackson argues that, consequently, this leads to creating simplified and hostile representations of the Islam and Muslims.36 In this respect, Jackson acknowledges that within the Orientalist tradition, Muslims have been
33 Jackson, 398. Jackson points out that David Rapoport’s article, 'Fear and Trembling: Terrorism in Three Religious Traditions' from 1984 has functioned as a key article in developing the subject of 'religious terrorism' and the rise of ‘experts’ in 'Islamic terrorism'. See David Rapoport, “Fear and Trembling: Terrorism in Three Religious Traditions,” American Political Science Review 78 (1984): 658–77. 34 Jackson, 399. 35 Jackson mentions that in the 1970’s and 1980’s there were the events of the 1973 oil shocks, the 1979 Iranian revolution and embassy hostage crisis, the Rushdie affair and the terrorist kidnappings and hijackings of the 1980s. Furthermore, with regard to Orientalist literature, Jackson mentions the well‐known essay 'The Clash of Civilizations?' from 1993 by Samuel Huntington as being a central text, since it “(…) reproduced a number of Orientalist claims for an international affairs audience and it is therefore an important antecedent of the current 'Islamic terrorism' discourse.” See Jackson, 399. See also: Samuel Huntington, “The clash of civilizations,” Foreign Affairs 72 (1993): 22‐49. 36 Jackson, 400.
24 represented as exotic and mysterious. Nevertheless, he stresses that for the most part, Muslims in general have been portrayed by the mainstream media through frameworks of “violence, threat, extremism, fanaticism and terrorism.”37 Bhatia makes a discourse analysis and focuses on the changing perceptions of terrorism that evolve from the way the Bush administration has dealt with, and spoken about, the issue of terrorism. With regard to the terrorism discourse, she distinguishes four dichotomies: good versus evil; law versus lawlessness; civilization versus savageness; and freedom versus tyranny.38 Compared to Bhatia, Jackson distinguishes less clear cut narratives. He mentions different strands of ‘violence’ and the ‘religion,’ which he links to ‘anti‐ modernism.’39 He does however stress one core narrative in particular: the threat narrative. Jackson states that;
“Perhaps the most important narrative of 'Islamic terrorism', however, is that it poses a massive threat to the security of the West. In most texts, it is seen as self‐ evident that 'Islamic terrorism' remains 'one of the most significant threats to the Western world in general and U.S. national security in particular'.”40
Here, Jackson refers to the threat narrative as the main narrative of the discourse in Islamic terrorism. This is similar to my finding that the threat narrative forms the main overarching filmic narrative within THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES. According to Jackson, the discursive threat narrative evolves from what he calls ‘new terrorism;’
“The 'new terrorism' thesis argues that, driven by hatred, fanaticism and extremism rather than by political ideology, today's religiously inspired terrorists are determined to cause mass casualties among civilians, are driven to sacrifice themselves in murderous suicide attacks and would be willing to
37 Ibid. 38 Bhatia, 281. 39 Jackson, 406. 40 Ibid., 407.
25 employ weapons of mass destruction. It is therefore a more murderous form of terrorism than the world has seen before.”41
Here, Jackson connects terrorism to ‘extremism,’ ‘suicide attacks’ and ‘mass destruction.’ These are not so much narrative categories, but rather acts that can be located within the larger threat narrative as well.
The binary categorization of terrorism and practices of ‘outcasting’
Looking at the discursive narratives Bhatia and Jackson distinguish, these correspond with the filmic narratives I described in the previous chapter. If we look at the type of discursive as well as filmic narratives, it’s remarkable that they seem to come only in terms of two elements which are opposed to each other, like it’s almost a necessity: one can’t exist without the other. In this sense, the binary categories are self‐descriptive; good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness are constructing each other through their binary character, one doesn’t exist without the other. At the same time, this makes them self‐reflective categories as well; we can only reflect on the Good through the category of the Bad and vice versa. In this respect, Jackson comments that the construction of the ‘Islamic terrorist’ or ‘extremist’ is highly dependent on the use of binary categorizations.42 Such categorizations lead us to thinking in opposites of “the West versus the Islamic world, extremists versus moderates, violent versus peaceful, democratic versus totalitarian, religious versus secular, medieval versus modern and savage versus civilized.”43 This would also explain why in our current cultural state, there is such a sharp division between the Islamic Middle East and the West, like Hans Koechler already mentioned. When we go into the purpose and functioning of such categorical
41 Ibid., 408. 42 Jackson, 401. 43 Ibid.
26 dichotomies, Bhatia notes that ‘evilification’ is a discursive strategy to declare moral judgement. Furthermore, it is a means to outcast a certain group enhancing the ‘us’ ‘them’ dichotomy. She also states that, by ‘vilifying’ the ‘other’, the terrorists are essentialized and come to represent a homogeneous group.44 This we see clearly in the films as they present us with images of detainees in orange suit, all looking the same with their shaved heads and/or hoods and goggles on. According to Bhatia then; “The language of good and evil has proved one of the most persistent weapons in the ‘war against terror.’ ”45 Next, Bhatia elaborates on the category of law versus lawlessness. Just like evil, lawlessness functions to create an outcast group, which involves the “ ‘lawful’ West and the ‘unlawful’ East.”46 This is what Bhatia calls ‘orientalization,’ a discursive strategy that distinguishes between a ‘core’ Western order and the ‘other,’ hence out‐casting the ‘East.’ Also closely related to the strategy of outcasting is the opposition of civilization versus savageness, in which savageness is connected to the ‘evil’ and ‘unlawful’ East. Consequently, Bhatia links the metaphor of civilization versus savageness to the associative dichotomy of “freedom vs. tyranny, which complements the whole concept of democracy, liberation and respect for human rights.”47
Problemising the discursive categories
What’s interesting is that in her discussion of the binary discursive categories, Bhatia mentions that all these categories involve the element of outcasting; they construct an ‘us’ versus ‘them’ dichotomy, which forms the main strategy to oppose the Middle East to the West. So to understand how the films deconstruct the boundaries between the concepts of the Middle East and the West and reveal
44 Bhatia, 282. 45 Ibid., 283. 46 Ibid. 47 ibid., 285.
27 them as constructions, we have to pay attention to the way these films deal with the practice of outcasting, which seems to be inherent to the discursive narratives that Bhatia distinguishes. Furthermore, Bhatia makes an important claim that by these categorizations “terrorism is marshalled into one entity, something that can be attacked or dealt [with].”48
However, the films of THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and
THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES show quite the opposite. They convey that in an attempt to ‘deal with’ the threat of terrorism, many innocent people have become victims; the characters of Asif, Rahul and Shafiq in THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO were falsely imprisoned, just like the murdered Afghan taxi driver
Dilawar and ex‐detainee Moazzam Begg in TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE. The soldiers in
TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, are portrayed as victims too; victims of unclear policy guidelines of the Bush administration. In this sense, the films draw on the similar discursive narratives of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness as Bhatia distinguishes, but to a different end. Whereas Bhatia states that these discursive narratives make terrorism seem to be something that can be fought against, the narratives being used in the films convey the opposite: that terrorism isn’t something that can be ‘dealt with.’ One of the reasons for this according to THE
POWER OF NIGHTMARES is that the terrorism threat doesn’t exist; it’s not even there. How is it possible then, that these filmic narratives, which are similar to the discursive narratives Bhatia distinguishes, function in such a different way? In this respect, Jackson comments that the categories that function to make ‘terrorism’ less abstract, are an illusion. He points out that such categories and labels are “culturally loaded and highly flexible in the way they are deployed.”49 Because these narrative categories are flexible, they can be used in different ways. In my analysis, I will elaborate upon this by looking at the process of cultural semiotics. Using the idea of contingency and its inherent ‘double contextuality’ I will explore how the double context of the filmic narrative in
48 Bhatia, 286. 49 Jackson, 401.
28 combination with the discursive narrative functions in creating the symbolic meaning of the films. Let us first get a better understanding of cultural semiotics in relation to contingency now.
‘Cultural semiotics’ and ‘contingency’
Drawing on Lotman, I will look at the interaction between actors and their changing status of ‘positive semioticity’ and ‘negative semioticity’.50 Negative semioticity involves the idea of an ‘extra culture’; how by developing a specific cultural semioticity, in which things come to mean something by their incorporation in the broader cultural sign system, boundaries are constructed between the own culture and what lies ‘outside’ that culture.51 According to Lotman, the own culture then, has a ‘positive’ semioticity. Crucial for the interaction and semioticity of the actors in the films, is the idea of contingency and its inherent double contextuality. Contingency is a quality rather than a concept as it deals with arbitrariness and claims of truth and falsehood.’52 Contingency is widely used to analyze literary works. Svend
50 By positive semiotic signs I don’t mean that they truly are positive, but that in Western culture these signs, symbols and icons are generally perceived as ‘positive’ since they’re heavily being associated with the idea of Good. 51 This is similar to Baudrillard’s idea of ‘hyperreality’ where objects loose their meaning and only come to mean something by their relation to other objects within a certain cultural system. See: Jean Baudrillard, "Simulacra and Simulations," in Selected Writings, ed. Mark Poster (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), 166‐184. 52 Contingency is more a characteristic or quality than an independent tool; truth for instance, looses its meaning because something is contingent. Contingency is closely related to the concepts of ‘myth’ and ‘memory.’ The construction of myths we can explain by Larsen’s notion of contingent manifestations of human culture. By this he means that human culture is based on cultural memories, which are “arbitrary fragments absorbed by the discursive process.” See: Svend Erik Larsen, “Subjective Contingency and Autobiographical Writing,” Arcadia International Journal for Literary Studies 39 (2004): 289. In this respect, I would argue that our Western identity consists of small arbitrary fragments that are part of a larger discourse of Good versus Evil. In the ‘war against terror’ we try to stabilise our Western identity through our every day
29 Larsen, who draws on contingency in his article on autobiographical writing, notes that; “According to philosophy, contingency, in the strict sense of the word, means that which exists without formal necessity.”53 If we relate this to the issue of terrorism then, we could say that terrorism by itself is an abstract concept, it has no form by itself. Still we have a rather clear idea of ‘terrorism’ by that this concept has become linked to the image of Osama Bin Laden, which has become an icon for the concept of terrorism. Furthermore, Larsen states that contingency involves what he calls a ‘double contextuality,’ which consists of a ‘referential context,’ one that refers to the actual experiences and events – or the life it refers to –, and a second ‘discursive contextuality,’ meaning; “the narrative trajectory that shapes the reference.”54 I will draw upon the concept of double contextuality, in which I equal the referential contextuality with the ‘filmic narrative’ and the discursive contextuality with the overall ‘discursive narrative’ that evolves from the dominant discourse on Islamic terrorism. Such a double contextuality then, I will use to analyze the contingency of the actors by considering the role both contextualities play in the process of the changing semioticity of the actors. At the same time, this allows me to comment on the interrelation and interdependency of these contextualities as well as on the process of cultural semiotics. Consequently, I will argue that the interaction between both contextualities allows for a cultural semiotics with permeable boundaries, so without rigid distinctions between the ‘own culture’ and the ‘extra culture.’ Going into the process of cultural semiotics in particular, I distinguish between the strategy of ‘character identification,’ which enhances the act of ‘cultural translation’, and ‘metatext,’ which means that these films as media refer to other (news) media. These strategies function to dramatise the issue of terrorism, but foremost, they construct a strong referential context, or filmic
news media, which confirms our position of the Good. At the same time, this enhances the ‘myth’ of the Good West against the Evil terrorist forces of the Middle East. 53 Larsen, 282. 54 Ibid.
30 narrative, which enables the referential context to becomes dominant over the pre‐established discursive contextuality, or discursive narrative. What both these strategies have in common then, is the central aspect of contingency, through which division between the West and Middle East is contested.55
Discourse and the metaphor of the ‘rhizome’
Closely related to my audiovisual analysis, is my discourse analysis. Drawing upon Islamic terrorism discourse analysts Jackson and Bhatia, I will distinguish several cultural narratives that are presented in these films, which I have already mentioned. The audiovisual analysis functions to comment on the dominant discourse of Islamic terrorism; how these films, through their contingency and strategies of character identification and metatext, contribute to the opening up and change of the dominant terrorism discourse. Following Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, I am interested in “analysing how the structure, in the form of discourses, is constituted and changed.”56 The starting point of Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory is that we construct objectivity through the construction of meaning.57 My aim here is not to lay bare the ‘truth,’ but to “explore how we create this reality so that it appears objective and natural.”58 Besides, it’s important to note that, like Jørgensen and Phillips point out, the analyst him or herself is also part of a discourse; “Although discourse analysis is about distancing oneself from these discourses and telling
55 The process of combining seemingly different cultures has been explored also by Lévi‐Strauss, who analyzed how myths work to overcome cultural paradoxes. See: Claude Lévi‐Strauss, Myth and Meaning (London, 1978). 56 Here, I use the work of Marianne Jørgensen and Louise Phillips who discuss the discourse theory of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. See: Marianne Jørgensen and Louise Phillips, Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method (London: Sage, 2002). For original works of Laclau and Mouffe, see: Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, Hegemony & Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics (London and New York: Verso, 1985). 57 Jørgensen and Phillips, 33. 58 Ibid.
31 the pure truth, truth in itself being always a discursive construction.”59 What then, is the purpose of discourse analysis? According to Jørgensen and Phillips discourse analysis aims to;
(...) map out the processes in which we struggle about the way in which the meaning of signs is to be fixed, and the processes by which some fixations of meaning become so conventionalised that we think of them as natural.60
This thesis however, focuses on the process of cultural semiotics, in which the meaning of a sign is being stripped off its seemingly fixed discursive meaning and becomes fluid again. In this sense, this thesis draws upon previous discourse analyses of Jackson and Bhatia, to explore how an alternative discourse is created. Still, such an alternative discourse evolves from the dominant discourse it criticises. In this respect I we might speak of the creation of a ‘meta‐discourse.’ Part of the central question in this thesis is how the films relate to the dominant terrorism discourse. So how should we interpret and locate these films with regard to the dominant discursive practices of producing seemingly fixed meanings? To what degree can we speak of these films as counter? Can we place these films within the dominant discourse or do they operate outside of it? In what way should we think of a discourse, in what form or metaphor? In this respect, I propose the metaphor of the ‘rhizome’ as developed by Gilles Deleuze. The rhizome I will use as a metaphor to explore and theorise the structure and functioning of the Islamic terrorism discourse, and by that I mean the overall discourse that includes ‘the dominant’ as well as ‘the counter.’ Earlier I stressed the difficulty of altering and exposing the concepts ‘the West’ and ‘the Middle‐East’ as cultural constructions, since I’m depending on their already established meaning(s) in order to nuance the image we have of the Middle‐East; I’m only able to expose that which I want to expose by actually drawing on its already established and seemingly fixed meaning. In this sense, I’m moving within the concepts I’m criticizing, rather than being located outside
59 Ibid., 49. 60 Ibid., 25.
32 them. By this I mean that to expose one thing as being something else is not to see it separately, so as ‘one’ and ‘the other.’ Instead, we should be perceptive of their interdependency and conceive of them as being actually part of one and the same discourse, rather than opposing what’s ‘dominant’ and ‘counter.’
33 Theorizing the image: Analysis
Segmentation, narratives and themes
To get an overview of the main actors I will now discuss an inventory of reoccurring images within the films.61 The films include a variety of indices that are important in the (re)presentation of Islamic terrorism, which I have divided in people, animals, locations and objects. Some indices reoccur more often than others and are given an exclamation mark:
People Locations Objects and events Media and animals ‐ Bush (!) ‐ Downing Street ‐ American flag (!) ‐ tv news ‐ Blair (!) ‐ the White House (!) ‐ yellow taxi (!) programmes ‐ Rumsfeld ‐ Supreme Court Building ‐ Pepsi sign (!) ‐ Cheney ‐ the Twin Towers ‐ Pizza Hut sign ‐ news paper ‐ Bin Laden (!) ‐ mosques (!) ‐KFC sign article ‐ politicians ‐ skyscrapers ‐ orange suits (!) ‐ declaration ‐ soldiers (!) ‐ sandy landscapes (!) ‐ shackles (!) form physical ‐ attorneys ‐ crowded/ polluted cities ‐ bars exam ‐ journalists ‐ hoods (!) ‐ agents ‐ goggles (!) ‐ terrorism experts ‐ turbans (!) ‐ Arab fighters (!) ‐ beards (!) ‐ demonstrating mass ‐ long dresses (!) ‐ detainees (!) ‐ head scarves ‐ women in burkas ‐ grave marker ‐ police men ‐ airplanes (!) ‐ television presenters ‐ helicopters (!) ‐ dead bodies ‐ busy traffic ‐ wounded people ‐ sun (!) ‐ flies ‐ clouds ‐ dogs ‐ lights of a car ‐ cows ‐ chandeliers ‐ donkey ‐ sealed road ‐ black horse ‐tanks ‐ guns (!) ‐ missiles ‐ explosions
61 Drawing on my segmentation, I have made with an outline of the opening sequences of THE
ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, see attachments 4, 5 and 6. For the segmentation of the films, see attachment 1, 2 and 3.
34
These indices function as actors in the films; they have a heightened meaning within the overall narrative, influencing the way the story is presented to us. Frequently used indices are the images of Bush, Blair and Bin Laden. Furthermore, the figures of soldiers, Arab fighter and detainees are very common indices as well. The main locations presented to us in the films are the White House, mosques and sandy landscapes. We see a lot of images of the American flag, airplanes, guns and connected to the figure of the detainee we see the images of shackles, hoods, orange suits and goggles reappear. Other common indices are long dresses, turbans and beards that give the figures in the film their Middle Eastern appearance. Finally, news television programs are an important indice too. What then, is the location of these indices within the larger narrative of the films? What is their role as ‘actor’ and how do they relate to the other actors? To answer this, I focused on the kind of narratives the films are presenting us with.62 By looking at images as well as sound and words uttered by the characters in the films, I have divided the narratives of these films in several smaller sub‐narratives. These are; 1)‘good versus evil’; 2) ‘law versus lawlessness’ and 3) ‘civilization versus savageness.’ These are connected to the reoccurring theme of ‘light and darkness.’ Inherent to the narrative strand of law versus lawlessness is the theme of ‘human versus inhuman’ and the strand of civilization versus savageness can be connected to ‘modernity versus tradition.’ Eventually, all these strands and themes are connected as they come together in a larger overarching narrative; the ‘threat’ narrative, which is linked to the theme of truth versus falsity.’ This theme is mainly portrayed by images of television news programmes.
62 This part of the analysis can be found in attachment 7.
35 Actors within the narratives
For my analysis, the central question at each narrative strand was: how are the actors used to create opposites of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness. What is the position of the actors within these sub‐narratives? Regarding the theme of the ‘Good’ and the ‘Bad’ the ‘good’ is personified in the persons of Bush and Blair, our Western political leaders. Evil on the other hand is often personified in images of Middle‐Eastern men with beards, turbans and long dresses, who sometimes hold a gun. Nevertheless, the actors of turbans, beards and long dresses hence act as presentations of good as well as evil, depending on their narrative context. What is most remarkable is the use of light and dark metaphors in the films, which are used to illustrate the narrative of good versus evil and enhance the atmosphere of a luring threat. The second narrative that I distinguished is law versus lawlessness. How are the different actors used to create opposites of law versus lawlessness? What is the position of the actors within this sub‐narrative? The idea of the lawless we see in these films in opposition then to the American law, which is associated with the narrative of the good, the righteous. Located within the narrative of the film, the indices of Rumsfeld, the Supreme Court House and the White House come to mean the law. These indices are opposed to Bin Laden and images of detainees, who are ‘the lawless.’ The narrative of good versus evil and law versus lawlessness are interrelated in the sense that the actors of the law operate on the same level as the actors of the good. They’re located in the same ‘field of meaning’ so to speak. The same applies to the actors of the lawless, which fall in the same category as the actors of evil. However, within the overall narrative, who is lawless and who is not, becomes ambiguous; politicians become actors of the lawless because they condone torture, detainees become victims, rather than the lawless. A third narrative in these films is civilization versus savageness, which is presented by opposing indices such as deserted dusty golden brown landscapes with some mountains with modern skyscrapers and clean structured roads. Furthermore, the films make a distinction between civilization versus savageness by showing well‐known labels from the West, like Diesel, Nike, GAP
36 and Adidas. The meaning of well‐known Western labels becomes established in these films by contrasting these images with ‘savage’ circumstances of flies buzzing around meat and busy polluted streets. Moreover, we see political leaders like Bush and Blair dressed in business suits, whereas the Middle Eastern men are wearing long comfortable dresses that look rather plain and practical. The difference in clothing refers to the theme of modernity versus tradition. This theme is also present in indices like the mosque versus the airplane. Airplanes as well as helicopters and cars are actors of modern transport technology in these films, which are opposed by actors of traditional transport, like donkeys and horses. Consequently, we can ask on what axis then, do these sub‐narratives of ‘good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilized versus savageness’ operate? Actors come to mean different things as they are located in different narrative strands. Bush for instance, initially stands for the good, but also for the law and (American) civilization. The narrative strands and their related themes of ‘light versus darkness’; ‘human versus inhuman,’ and ‘modernity versus tradition’ are closely connected, sometimes overlapping. It’s important to note that the narratives don’t just create opposites, but question them too, blurring the line between seemingly clear categories of what is good and evil, lawful or lawless, civilized or savage. Though being different, all three sub‐narratives are embedded within the larger ‘threat’ narrative, a threat that can exist because of the creation of opposite categories of good and evil, law versus lawless and civilized or savage. The threat element then, stems from the binary categorization which creates a circumstance in which it either goes one way or the other. The threat narrative is mainly constructed by the actors that function by a combination of the evil, the lawless and the barbarian. Inherent to the threat narrative in these films then, is the theme of fiction and reality; what is true and what is false. All three films address the ambiguous role of the press in the terrorism issue. In this sense, these films have a similar investigating character, especially regarding the use and functioning of different actors, which can change in meaning, dependent on their narrative embeddings.
37 Filmic narratives in perspective
Thus far I have discussed the several indices as actors embedded in different narratives. The sub‐narratives of ‘good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilized versus savageness’ ‐ and their related themes of light and darkness, human versus inhuman and tradition versus modernity – operate on the axis of truth versus falsity, that is part of the broader, overarching threat narrative. For now we can conclude that the actors don’t just function within the narratives to create opposites, but address and question these supposed oppositions of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness. The meaning of these actors are fluid and changeable; their semioticity changes. Now that we have made an inventory of the main actors within the narratives and themes of the films THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, I will continue by considering these findings in relation to the existing discursive narrative structures of Islamic terrorism and how, through the semioticity or the interaction of certain audiovisual signs, an alternative narrative is created. The central questions in this part involve: what do the narratives and themes of these films mean; how do they relate to the dominant terrorism discourse? Moreover, how do they contribute to the symbolic power of these films and in what way are they allowing for the creation of something like a ‘counter discourse’? I will link Bhatia’s discursive narratives to the filmic narratives I distinguished in my analysis. Though the discursive narratives and filmic narratives are similar, they function in a different way. Asking how this is possible, I will explore the changing semioticity of the actors by looking at the double contextuality, which involves interaction between the discursive contextuality (the discursive narrative) and the referential context (the filmic narrative). As part of this interaction I will focus on the strategies of outcasting, cultural translation and character identification that are typical for THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO and TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE. Next I will go into the construction of a
‘metatext,’ which is mostly characteristic for THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES. Analyzing these strategies of outcasting, cultural translation, character identification and
38 the construction of a metatext help to finally answer the question of how the narratives and themes contribute to the symbolic power of these films and in what way they allow for the construction of a ‘counter discourse.’
The discursive contextuality and outcasting: Bush versus the detainee
If we look at the double contextuality in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO for example, we see the film starts with Bush at a press conference, stating: “The only thing I know for certain is that these are bad people.” President Bush is located within the referential narrative as well as the discursive narrative; everyone knows Bush is the president of America and he’s well‐known for his so called ‘war on terror.’ In this sense he’s part of a pre‐set discursive contextuality, in which Bush is an actor of the ‘good’ as well as the ‘lawfull’ and the ‘civilised.’ This is supported and reinforced by other associative actors like the White House, American flag, Twin Towers, Rumsfeld, Cheney and Blair. These are all Western indices, serving the main actor of Bush, which has an superior semiotic status over the other ‘Western’ actors. At the beginning of the story, Bush functions as an actor within the discursive contextuality, which overshadows the filmic narrative. However, the image of Bush appears again later on in the film. This time we cut from the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay to Bush saying: “Remember these, the ones in Guantanamo Bay are killers, they’re erm…they don’t share the same values we share.” Next we cut to a prisoner with goggles on behind the fence. The combination of Bush and the image of a detainee opposes these actors and creates an ‘us’ versus ‘them’ dichotomy, which is supported by the words uttered by Bush who opposes ‘they,’ ‘the killers,’ to ‘we.’ Such a practice of outcasting is possible because, initially, within the discursive narrative, Bush personifies everything we associate with the West: the Good, Lawfull and the Civilised. This way, the figure of the detainee automatically stands for the Middle Eastern terrorist, symbolizing the evil, lawless savage: being everything that we’re not. Here, the meaning of the actor of the detainee is determined by the actor of Bush, whose meaning stems from its location within
39 the overall discursive contextuality of the dominant terrorism discourse. The primary semiotic status of the actor of Bush then, initiates the outcasting of the ‘Middle Eastern Other.’ Nevertheless, when we consider this fragment not just as a discursive construction, but analyze it within the overall filmic narrative, the actors of Bush and the detainee relate differently to each other, which creates a different meaning.
The filmic narrative; cultural translation and identification
Though the dominant discourse offers us discursive narratives that we can use as framework to interpret actors, the interrelated filmic narrative is also highly influential in creating the actor’s meaning. By time we see the image of Bush reoccur halfway through the film, we’ve seen the boys crossing the border into Afghanistan where they have been bombed, threatened and captured without any legitimate reason. We’ve been witnessing their inhumane treatment, their struggle and their torture. As the story in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO is told by the characters and we’re following them on their journey, we start to identify with these characters. Through the strategy of character identification then, the filmic narrative becomes dominant over the discursive narrative. The identification with the boys is enhanced through the aspect of ‘foreignness’ in the film, which is taking us out into the world of the Middle East. In this respect, the unfamiliar language we hear, functions as an actor of ‘the foreign;’ whenever people speak in Pakistani, Urdu or other languages, there are no subtitles, so we can’t understand what is being said, just like the boys don’t understand most of what is being said, it’s foreign for them too. This way we, the viewers, have something in common with the characters of Asif, Shafiq and Rahul. Also, we’re dependent on these characters, since they are the only ones we understand because of their English language; they’re our link to the West.
This way, THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO can be conceived of as a translation of Muslim culture for us as Western viewers; the Pakistani boys from England take us with them on their journey through countries that are unknown to us as well as to
40 them. We, as a Western audience, are allowed to enter into the world of the ‘other’ through the lens of the camera while following the boys. The feeling of ‘foreignness’ we share with the characters, as well as our dependency on Asif, Shafiq and Rahul as our ‘guides,’ reinforces the bond we feel with these main characters. Besides the cultural translation and character identification, another important element to enhances the character identification, is the hybrid British‐ Pakistani identity of the boys; they belong to ‘them’ as well as to ‘us.’ These characters function as ‘tools of negotiation,’ mediating between actors of the West, i.e. Bush, the American flag, a Pepsi sign, a GAP jumper, and actors of the Middle East, like men with beards and turbans in long dresses, busy traffic, crowded cities, flies and dusty landscapes. The characters of the boys are shown in relation to these actors; rather than serving the practice of outcasting, the actors function to create a certain atmosphere and give us a sense of the background of the ‘Middle Eastern Other.’ This ‘Middle Eastern Other’ is, through the character of the boys, no longer one of ‘them,’ but also becomes part of ‘us.’
The face of terrorism
Identifying ourselves with the boys, we start drawing on their frame of reference. At the beginning of the film, the boys are indirectly introduced by Bush as ‘bad people’ only to counter that idea as the film progresses. Right after the press conference at the beginning of the film, for example, we cut to a shot of Asif brushing his teeth in the bathroom. Such a simple act functions to stress that they’re ordinary human beings, with no evil intentions. This is also made obvious by utterances like Rahul, who says “Monir was a very nice guy. He was Bengoli like me. He would never say anything bad against anybody” (0:03:41). Also, their motives for going to Afghanistan are to see a different culture, help people, but most of all, the boys are exited about the naan breads; Rahul says “They have naans, this big!” (0:00:00).
Similarly, in TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, the evilification of the Middle Eastern Other functions also to oppose it with an image of the Middle Eastern Other as
41 ‘good.’ The film starts with Dilawar’s brother standing in front of Dilawar’s grave. He has brown hair, a beard and wears a long dress. He speaks in a foreign language and tells Dilawar was a hard working man who loved to drive the tractor ever since he was a little boy. That’s how he became a taxi driver. Here, the filmic narrative creates a picture of Dilawar as a good man. In this respect, the actors of the green fields, the cow and the donkey contribute to a sense of innocence and harmlessness and function to support the actor of the Middle Eastern man with his dark hair, beard and turban. Overall then, the abstract, simplified concept of terrorism is portrayed by these films as a complicated issue; the face we want to give to terrorism in the figure of the man with the beard and the turban ‐ ultimately presented in the person of Osama Bin Laden ‐ is explored, interrogated and presented as ‘false’ by the filmic narratives. The boys in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO become the face of terrorism without actually being terrorist: their terrorist status is imposed upon them. Consequently, once the boys, just like Dilawar, become unified with the actor of the detainee, with their shaved heads and dressed in orange suits, they don’t suit the label of the ‘bad’ that ‘naturally’ comes with the actor of the detainee. We identify with these characters, or at least feel we ‘know’ them. To see these characters in the actor of the detainee then, causes a tension between the image and it’s associated label of the ‘bad,’ which destabilises the seemingly fixed meaning of the detainee; here, the image of the detainee as ‘bad’ is questioned by these films, which automatically calls for a re‐evaluation of the ‘good,’ which is personified in the actor of Bush. Both images of the detainee and Bush become subject to the question of who is good and who is bad. This way, their discursive construction, and hence their contingent meaning, becomes visible within the filmic narrative.
Constructing filmic narrative: metatext
In THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO cultural translation and identification with the characters function as a strategy to create dominance of the filmic narrative over
42 the discursive narrative. TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES on the other hand, don’t present us with clear main characters we can easily identify with. Instead, they tell their story mostly through voice‐overs, interviews and archive footage. Still, these films too build up a filmic narrative that becomes dominant over the discursive narrative it is initially embedded in. Rather than offering us ways to identify with the characters, they use the strategy of ‘metatext;’ they’re commenting on other media, while they are media themselves. THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES in particular, comments in a direct way on the role of the international media in spreading the ‘terrorist threat.’ It addresses the terrorism threat as spectacle by including fragments of television news, which I already discussed earlier.
THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES foregrounds the falsity and deception by the media regarding information about the terrorist threat. TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE stresses the untruthfulness or at least incompleteness of the media reports as well by commenting on a press release that lacked crucial information about the deaths of the two detainees from Bagram prison. In THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, the media play a role as well since we hear male or female British voice‐overs reporting the events in the Middle East. These fragments function to acknowledge the role of the media in providing us with information about distant events and hence, determining the way we perceive ‘the war against terrorism.’ Besides that, we also see Bush giving statements at press conferences, referring to the media as a tool used by politicians to convey their messages, whether these are true or not. So all three films reveal, directly or indirectly, the ambiguity of the media. This problematises their own status as a medium too; the films explore the seemingly objective character of the media as being subjective and spectacular, while at the same time, these films are spectacles themselves as they dramatise the terrorism threat narrative by its subjective filmic sub‐narratives of good and evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness. Nevertheless, the subjective dramatising practices of the films become invisible by the very act of commenting on news media; criticising the spectacular and dramatising practises of news media, these films imply to oppose themselves to the falsity of news media and the dramatization of
43 terrorism. Consequently, this enhances their status as objective presentations, which is also reinforced by their documentary status as such. On another level, their ‘objectivity’ is supported by the film style; I already addressed the hand held cameras, voice‐overs, interviews with people and use of archive footage in the previous part. These ‘tools of objectivity’ are important for the semioticity, because they construct the filmic narrative, or the referential context, which influences the status of the actors as ‘real.’ In this respect, Laclau and Mouffe are right when they note that we construct objectivity through the construction of meaning.63 These ‘truth’ enhancing elements allow for the development of a plausible filmic narrative, which is needed to become dominant over the discursive contextuality; in order to believe the changing semioticity and believe in Bush as the Bad and the Lawless, the filmic narrative, so what we see and hear, must be credible.64
Discourse as a rhizome
The films construct their symbolic meaning by drawing upon narrative categories of the dominant terrorism discourse. This enables them to construct their own filmic narrative or referential contextuality, one that is based upon the discursive contextuality, but at the same time, differs from it. THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO draws heavily on the strategy of character identification to construct a strong filmic narrative, which consequently becomes dominant over the discursive narrative and its inherent seemingly fixed labels and categories of meaning. This way, the film blurs the line between the West and the Middle East, creating a space in which meaning can be negotiated.
63 Jørgensen and Phillips, 33. 64 Within these films, the theme of truth and falsity function as a main strategies of dramatisation. The objective and seemingly truthful feel of these films then, is exactly what adds to their dramatic character; we are mostly shocked by the narratives, because it’s ‘true.’ If we knew it would be fiction, it would be less impressive. Eventually, it is the connection to reality what makes these films dramatic. It’s ironic then that the films offer us spectacle and dramatisation of Islamic terrorism, while that is their main critique on the news media
44 Within this space of negotiation then, different actors of the West do not necessarily oppose actors, which would ‘normally’ – that is from the perspective of the dominant Islamic discourse – present the Middle Eastern Other.65 The ‘Western’ actors as well as the ‘Middle Eastern’ actors all are located within the same arena, rather than being isolated from each other in separate categories. In this sense, the filmic narrative operates within the discursive narrative as it is deconstructing the categorical boundaries that characterize the dominant Islamic discourse.
TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES operate in a similar way, but still, they differ from THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO. Rather than using the strategy of character identification, the filmic narrative in these films is mainly constructed by the use of a voice‐over and interviews, which function to support the actors. The most important element in these films is the construction of a metatext, which gives the filmic narrative the credibility that is necessary to allow for a fluid semioticity; the seemingly objective character of the films, supports the narration by the voice‐over and the interviews, which together, provides the referential context, or filmic narrative, for the actors. These films distance themselves then, from the discursive contextuality by critically assessing the meaning of the actors. Whereas THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO adopts a more indirect approach, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and especially THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES are more direct films by literally re‐ evaluating the role of the actor of Bush as ‘good’ or Bin Laden as a ‘dangerous terrorist,’ which consequently destabilises their seemingly fixed discursive meaning. In this interaction between the referential contextuality and discursive context, the actors operate as fluid entities, blurring the boundaries and deconstruction dichotomies. This makes their differential position, or contingency, within the overall terrorism discourse visible. The semiotic fluidity of these actors however, is dependent on the portrayal and existence of the
65 The idea of ‘spaces of negotiation’ is further developed by Inge Boer, who thinks of boundaries as ‘spaces of negotiation,’ rather than fixed lines. See: Inge Boer, Uncertain territories: boundaries in cultural analysis. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2006.
45 binary divisions of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness in the first place; to criticise the dominant discursive terrorism narrative and its seemingly fixed categorical concepts, these categories first have to be acknowledged. With such an interdependency between the filmic narrative and the discursive narrative then, we can consider these films as ‘alternative’ discursive constructions, rather than as a separate ‘counter’ discourse. Instead of being entities that oppose the dominant discourse, to create a different meaning, these films locate themselves within the dominant discourse. In this respect, I would like to propose the metaphor of the ‘rhizome’ as developed by Gilles Deleuze. In his reading of Deleuze and Guattari, Marcus Doel points out the importance of the rhizome metaphor in the Deleuzoguattarian corpus since they:
“strangle the roots and scramble the codes of all arboreal and sedentary thought; and second, they exemplify fractal surfaces expressing continuous variability (…). For whereas an arboreal system works through branching and hierarchical organization (a genealogy), a rhizome comprises an entanglement of contingent (disconnections (an antigenealogy). A tree or root fixes a central point, and thus an order, from which there emerges a preprogrammed, irreversible, and essentially hierarchical series of bifurcations. By contrast, everything on a rhizome is connectable and disconnectable (…) and everything can be either broken‐off or set into play; it is a multiplicity and a becoming, with a consistency all of its own—it does not lead, or refer back, to a being, subject, object, unity, or totality.”66
This description makes the rhizome a useful metaphor, because it stresses the contingency and multiplicity, and moreover the equality of different aspects, instead of proposing dichotomies. Overall then, we can think of a discourse as a rhizomatic structure; rather than proposing dichotomies the films deconstruct boundaries. They reveal the contingent meaning of actors and thereby foreground the multiplicity, and moreover the equality of different actors. This is
66 Doel, 334.
46 in line with Jørgensen and Phillips who point out that;
“All meaning is fluid and all discourses are contingent, it is objectivity that masks contingency and, in doing so, hides the alternative possibilities that otherwise could have presented themselves.”67
Jørgensen and Phillips stress the element of contingency and objectivity. Objectivity here however, functions to expose the contingency of the actors; the objectivity is needed to make the alternative meaning of the actor plausible. On the whole, we can say that a discourse pretends to consist of fixed meanings, offering us solid structures, or frameworks, through which we can interpret what we encounter. Nevertheless, these structures are nothing but fragments, held together by a sequence of arbitrariness; a discourse is contingent and therefore fluid, open and multiple. In this respect, we can perceive of a discourse the same as Jackson, who understands a discourse as;
“ (…) historically and culturally contingent, intertextual, open‐ended, requiring continuous articulation and re‐articulation and therefore, open to destabilization and counter‐hegemonic struggle.”68
Creating an alternative
Now we have come to know more about the origin of the Islamic terrorism discourse and its initial discursive narraratives, which are characterized by their binary categories and outcasting practices. Addressing the status and location of the actors within the double contextuality of the films, I have compared Bhatia’s discursive narratives, or the discursive contextuality, with the filmic narratives, or referential contextuality. I explored how, through the interaction of these contextualities the
67 Jørgensen and Phillips, 33 68 Jackson, 37.
47 semioticity of the actors becomes fluid by mainly focusing on the actors of Bush and the detainees, which I found to be the main actors as they are particularly used for the practice of outcasting; initially, within the discursive narrative, Bush personifies everything we associate with the West, whereas the figure of the detainee stands for the Middle Eastern terrorist, symbolizing the evil, lawless barbarian. I have shown how the meaning of these actors becomes fluid as the story progresses and the filmic narrative takes over; going against the practices of outcasting, the filmic narrative follows strategies of character identification, which contributes to the cultural translation in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, and metatext, which is mostly used in THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES. In the progress of the film, such strategies help to break away from the pre‐established discursive contextuality, allowing the film to distance itself from the dominant terrorism discourse. This way, the filmic narrative, or referential context, becomes superior to the discursive contextuality, blurring the boundaries between ‘us’ and ‘them.’ Opposing Bhatia’s claim that the discursive categories function to change terrorism from an abstract concept into a concrete situation, I have argued that within the filmic narratives of THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and
THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, the categorical binary narrative strands of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness convey that terrorism is abstract and isn’t something that can be easily fought against.69 Instead, the films show the issue of terrorism as complex; in these films the exact deed of trying to give terrorism a face by the actor of the detainees causes a tension within the meaning of the concept of the ‘terrorist.’ Overall, we have a better insight in the way the filmic narratives of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness that I distinguished previously relate to the dominant terrorism discourse. Consequently, I explored how these films draw upon the dominant discursive narratives to negotiate meaning and create an alternative narrative to the existing dominant Islamic discourse. These films operate then, by revealing the
69 Bhatia, 286.
48 contingency of the actors and the rhizomatic functioning of a discourse as a whole.
49 Conclusion
From a distance
The point of departure of this thesis was that frequent media portrayals of images like airplanes crashing into the Twin Towers, Osama Bin Laden, Bush declaring the ‘war against terror,’ Arab fighters, men with beards and turbans in long dresses and military troops moving through dusty sandy landscapes have all added to the construction of a dominant discourse on Islamic terrorism, codifying our perceptions of the terrorist threat. Studying THE ROAD TO
GUANTANAMO, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE and THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, the main question, was how do the films contribute to a shift in knowledge production about the Islam, as well as how do they relate to the dominant terrorism discourse? I started by asking what signs or ‘indices’ do we see in these films, which images reoccur? Interested in the ‘semiotics of terrorism’ then, I made in an inventory of the images that are much used to portray terrorism. I distinguished the actors of Bush, Blair, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Osama Bin Laden, Downing Street, the White House, the Twin Towers, the American flag, the taxi sign on top of a car, a Pepsi sign, Pizza Hut, KFC, flies, politicians, soldiers, attorney’s, agents, terrorism experts, Arab fighters, detainees in orange suits, women in burkas, police men, dead bodies, wounded people, shackles, bars, hoods, goggles, dogs, turbans, head scarves, grave marker, mosques, sandy landscapes, crowded and polluted cities, busy traffic, skyscrapers, airplanes, helicopters, sun, clouds, lights of a car, chandeliers, a sealed road, tanks, guns, missiles, explosions, television news programmes, a news paper article, a cow, donkey and a black horse. Consequently, I addressed the functioning of these actors and the way they ‘normalize’ our perception of terrorism as being associated with the Islam and the Middle East. Dividing the narrative in sub‐narratives of ‘good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilization versus savageness,’ which I connected to the themes of light and darkness, human versus inhuman and tradition versus modernity, I have discussed the heightened meaning of several actors as they are located within certain narrative strands. These actors then, are
50 embedded in different narratives which operate on the axis of ‘truth versus falsity’ that is part of the main, overarching ‘threat’ narrative. The main interest of this thesis however, is to go beyond the question of how terrorism is (re)presented in these films. Hence, after first making the inventory of indices and locating them within certain narrative strands I have asked: what do the narratives and themes of these films mean; how do they relate to the dominant terrorism discourse? Moreover, how do they contribute to the symbolic power of these films and in what way are they allowing for the creation of something like a ‘counter discourse’? To answer these questions, I have been deploying the idea of ‘contingency,’ which implies a ‘double contextuality’, in combination with the practice of ‘cultural semiotics,’ which helped to provide further insight in the semioticity of the actors. Focusing on the actors in relation to the existing discursive narrative structures of Islamic terrorism, I compared Bhatia’s discursive narratives, or the discursive contextuality, with the filmic narratives, or referential contextuality. Within this ‘double contextuality’ then, I distinguished the actors of Bush and the detainees as the main actors since their particular use for the practice of ‘outcasting,’ which is the main narrative strategy for the construction of the dominant terrorism discourse. Unlike Bhatia, who claims that the discursive categories function to change terrorism from an abstract concept into a concrete situation, I have argued that the categorical binary narrative strands of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilization versus savageness complicate the issue of terrorism and that by trying to give terrorism a face through the actor of the detainee, the concept of the ‘terrorist’ is being questioned. Moreover, in these films, the meaning of the actors becomes fluid as the story progresses and the filmic narrative becomes dominant over the discursive narrative, which blurs the boundaries between ‘us’ and ‘them.’ This happens through the strategies of character identification and metatext, which go against the practices of outcasting and help to break away from the pre‐established discursive contextuality. This way, the films distance themselves from the dominant terrorism discourse, allowing for the construction of alternative meanings.
51 Theoretical implications
To answer the broader question of how these films contribute to a shift in knowledge production about the Islam I focused on the process of cultural semiotics drawing heavily upon the concepts of contingency, double contextuality, semiotic fluidity and metatext. We have now a better understanding of how these films function and operate to create symbolic meaning and, more specifically, that the symbolic meaning of the films evolves from their relation to and interdependency with the dominant terrorism discourse. However, it’s also important to understand the theoretical implications of the concepts I have been using and the way they relate to each other. Locating the concepts of contingency, double contextuality, semiotic fluidity and metatext in relation to each other, we can say that the double contextuality, which is part of contingency, initiates a process of cultural semiotics; it produces the possibility for the filmic narrative and the discursive narrative to interact, which consequently allows for a semiotic fluidity of the actors. At the same time, this semiotic fluidity is dependent on the construction of a metatext which allows for the ‘plausibility’ of the alternative meaning of the actor. The metatext then, can be perceived as inherent to semiotic fluidity. Using the metaphor of the ‘rhizome’ I have explored the interrelation and interdependency of the discursive narrative and filmic narrative, arguing that the filmic narrative can distance itself from the discursive narrative, while still being part of this same discursive narrative. It’s important to have insight in the way the filmic discourse and discursive narrative are related to each other so we can get a better understanding of how a film can offer an alternative to the dominant discourse of Islamic terrorism. As this thesis has showed, this is a process, which is only possible if the filmic narrative can detach itself, or distance itself to a certain level from the discursive framework – the filmic narrative will never fully stand on its own, it will always still be connected somehow to the larger discursive narrative, therefore, it distances itself, rather than that it becomes detached. Commenting then, on the interrelation of the referential context and the
52 discursive contextuality it is important to note that a filmic narrative is of a different order than a discursive narrative. A filmic narrative is mainly created through its actors. At the same time, this narrative, as it is being composed, influences the referential context and hence the position or meaning of the actor within the larger narrative. It’s a multiple interactive process of actors relating to each other as well as to the narratives; the narrative construction on the other hand is dependent on its actors. A discursive narrative however, is pre‐established: an already existing narrative that is created and determined by its culture. The discursive narrative consists of fixed categories that offer us a framework so that we can interpret what we hear and see. Hence the discursive narrative is of a much greater order than the filmic narrative as the discursive narrative is a form of ‘common knowledge.’ Nevertheless, the line between a filmic narrative and a discursive narrative is rather vague in the sense that the filmic narrative presupposes the viewer is equipped with certain knowledge to understand the film. This way the filmic narrative, draws on the broader discursive narrative to create meaning. The actors then function within a pre‐established discursive narrative while creating the filmic narrative, which in turn influences the value and meaning of each actor for the overall filmic narrative. One could argue that this applies to any film, because basically everything is embedded within a discursive framework. However, the value of these films is of a higher order, because they don’t just go along with the dominant discourse; their filmic narratives aren’t just dissolving in the larger discursive framework. On the contrary; the films create a certain agency within the pre‐given discursive structures by establishing a filmic narrative that draws upon the discursive framework and at the same time, aims to alter it. The relevance of this thesis is that it explores how such a process can happen; it creates insight in what elements form a part of it and what kind of interaction is taking place. This is important because it allows us to critically evaluate the current cultural tensions as noted by cultural analysts like Koechler and Kaschuba, which involves a sharp division between the Islamic Middle East on the one side and the West on the other side. It gives us a better understanding of the cultural
53 dynamics at work; a dynamic that might seem to be impossible when supposedly ‘fixed’ dichotomies like the West and the Middle East form a sharp division between one and the other. However, as this thesis shows, it is the dichotomy, the binary categorizations, that bring up resistance, providing a space for debate in which meanings become negotiated, contesting the concepts of the ‘Middle East’ and the ‘West’ and revealing them as cultural constructions.
‘Metadiscursive practices’
Overall, we can conclude that while the filmic narrative distances itself from the discursive narrative, these films are dependent on the dominant discursive narratives and their self‐descriptive and self‐reflective binary categorization to be able to negotiate meaning and to create an alternative narrative to the existing dominant Islamic discourse. This is what I would like to call a ‘meta‐ discursive’ practice; the filmic narrative is used to comment on the discursive narrative, while simultaneously, the filmic narrative is part of the discursive narrative it comments on. Consequently, through their interaction, the filmic narrative and the discursive narrative reflect on each other and thereby expose the other narrative as contingent manifestations, which consist of arbitrary fragments that are combined into a whole. Eventually then, the contingency of the narratives is what gives the films their symbolic power, which allows for a shift in knowledge production about the Islam and hence in the overall meaning of the dominant terrorism discourse. Another central aspect of this thesis is that we can perceive of a discourse as rhizomatic; the elements I analyzed are not to be thought of as opposites of each other either, but as interacting as they are part of the same. This allows us to think of the dominant terrorism discourse as open and multiple in that it also includes elements that might go against dominant views and beliefs regarding the Middle‐East. It’s important that we don’t see the dominant ideas about terrorism and the Middle East as being part of a separate discourse than the alternatives being offered to these dominant concepts, because the elements that
54 construct the dominant ideas are the same that might deconstruct these ideas. In this sense, the rhizomatic structure enables the dominant discourse of Islamic terrorism to become fluid as it is negotiated from within its own structure. Therefore, we should perceive the terrorism discourse as a whole, without boundaries between the dominant and the counter. Instead, this supposed boundary is what provides the exact space in which notions of terrorism and its association with the Islam and Middle East are always changing. Only by perceiving the terrorism discourse, which is characterized by its multiple elements, as consisting of an in between, we can fully understand its functioning. This thesis then, learns that change lies in being partly the same.
55 Bibliography
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Domke, David. God Willing? Political Fundamentalism in the White House, the "War on Terror," and the Echoing Press. London: ML Pluto Press, 2004.
56 Dunn, Elizabeth W., Moriah Moore and Brian A. Nosek. “The war of the words: how linguistic differences in reporting shape perceptions of terrorism.” Analyses of social issues and public policy 5 (2005): 67‐86.
Entman, Robert. “Cascading activation: Contesting the White House's frame after 9/11.” Political Communication 20 (2003): 415‐432.
Ruigrok, Nel and Wouter van Atteveldt. “Global angling with a local angle: How U.S., British, and Dutch newspapers frame global and local terrorist attacks.” The Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics 12 (2007): 68‐90.
Gershkoff, Amy and Shana Kushner. “Shaping public opinion: The 9/11‐Iraq connection in the Bush administration’s rhetoric.” Perspectives on Politics 3 (2005): 525‐537.
Huntington. Samuel. “The clash of civilizations.” Foreign Affairs 72 (1993): 22‐49.
Jackson, Richard. “Constructing Enemies: ‘Islamic Terrorism’ in Political and Academic Discourse.” Government and Opposition 42 (2007): 394‐426.
Jørgensen, Marianne and Louise Phillips. Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method. London: Sage, 2002.
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Koechler, Hans. “The dialogue of civilizations: Philosophical basis, current state and prospects.” Asia Europe Journal 1 (2003): 315‐320.
Lachmann, Renate. “Counter‐memory and Phantasma.” Arcadia International Journal for Literary Studies 39 (2004): 291–300.
57 Laclau, Ernesto and Chantal Mouffe. Hegemony & Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics. London and New York: Verso, 1985.
Larsen, Svend Erik. “Subjective Contingency and Autobiographical Writing.” Arcadia. International Journal for Literary Studies 39 (2004): 282–290.
Lévi‐Strauss, Claude. Myth and Meaning. London: Routlegde, 1978.
Lotman, Juri. Universe of the Mind: A Semiotic Theory of Culture. Translated by Ann Shukman. London & New York: I. B. Tauris & Co, 1990.
Nagar, Naama. "Frames that Don't Spill: The News Media and the "War on Terrorism"." Paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Studies Association 48th Annual Convention, Chicago, USA, February 28, 2007.
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58 Schaffert, Richard W. Media Coverage and Political Terrorists: A Quantitative Analysis. New York: Praeger, 1992.
Schlesinger, Philip, Graham Murdock and Philip Elliott. Televising "terrorism": political violence in popular culture. London and New York: Comedia Pub. Group, 1983.
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Primary sources
9/11 (2002)
DC 9/11: TIME OF CRISIS (Brian Trenchard‐Smith, 2003)
TAXI TO THE DARKSIDE (Alex Gibney, 2007)
TAHE GE OF TERROR (Jon Blair, 2002)
TPHE OWER O F NIGHTMARES (Adam Curtis, 2004)
THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO (Mat Whitecross and Michael Winterbottom, 2006)
THE VOICE OF THE PROPHET (Robert Edwards, 2002)
UNITED 93 (Pa u l Gree ngrass, 2006)
WORLD TRADE CENTER (Oliver Stone, 2006)
WTC THE FIRST 24 HOURS (Etienne Sauret, 2002) www.roadtoguantanamomovie.com (accessed 22‐07‐2009).
59 www.taxitothedarkside.com (accesses 22‐07‐2009).
American Progress. www.americanprogress.org/issues/2008/02/gibney_interview.html (accessed 22‐07‐2009).
BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk (accessed 22‐07‐2009).
Fox. www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,136089,00.html (accessed 22‐07‐2009).
Rinf. www.rinf.com/news/sep‐2005/06.html (accessed 22‐07‐2009).
THE GUARDIAN. www.guardian.co.uk/film/2005/may/12/cannes2005.cannesfilmfestival4 (acc ess ed, 22‐07 ‐2 00 9).
THE WASHINGTON POST. www.washingtonpost.com/wp‐ dyn/content/discussion/2007/06/12/DI2007061200562.html (accessed 22‐07‐ 2009).
Truthout. www.truthout.org/article/iraq‐sale‐as‐not‐seen‐tv (accessed 22‐07‐ 2009).
60 SEGMENTATION THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO
Se Seg Dura Kernel/ Catalyse Location Cha Sound/image/mes Indice que ment tion racters nce
1 1 0:00:20 ‐ Catalyse: title US Bush ‐ Diegetic sound: American – Blair clicking sounf of flag ‐ Kernel: Bush: “the only cameras suit 0:00:32 thing I know for certain is that these are bad people. ‐ m‐e‐s: American flag And we look forward in backgroud of Bush. working closely with the Blair government to deal ‐ Non diegetic sound: with the issue.” music, low tone Halfway cut to ms Blair, then cut back to Bush.
1 2 0:00:32 ‐ Catalyse: Boy (Asif) Tipton, Asif ‐ Non diegetic: Passport brushing his teeth. Birminha Ruhel adidas track – m Uk: Shafiq ‐ Diegetic sound: suit ‐ Kernel: VO Asif tells his house Asif Monir sound of brushing mercedes 0:03:42 parents found a bride for teeth, cheering kids in sign at front him in Pakistan, so he got water, hunking, of taxi a ticket and went there. Birmingha engine of car, singing m airport at mosque ‐ Catalyse: we see him packing his bag and GAP jumper passport. Mother says something in foreign Pakistan montage: intercutting language to him, in between English she tells him to reconstruction and Traditional hurry up. interview with real Muslim Asif. Headcap ‐kernel: Asif arrives in Monir. Pakistan, text saying: 28 september 2001. ‐ catalyse: he takes a taxi Mix of languages. to his village: we see boys text with dates as Cap Ruhel playing in river, bust “evidence”/truthful
traffic.
Mosque ‐ kernel: Asif saw the girl Comment about and decided to get coming back soon and married, so he rang his also about friends to come over from Arabic sign passport/visa. UK. on street
‐ catalyse: When he rings Rahul, we see intercutting between uk (in proper Men in long house) and Pakistan dresses where Asif phones from some small store sitting on the floor surrounded by cans and a man in a Accent of long dress in the boys, slang background. 61
Rahul in interview tells he wanted to go to Asif because he is his friend. He packs, says goodbye to his family: hugging everyone and they all stand outside the house to wave him off. His little brother shouts: “come back soon.” Rahul replies “yeah, I come back soon.”
Rahul meets Shafiq and Monir, together they take a taxi to the airport. Shafic tells he wanted to go to Asif’s wedding, plus he hadn’t been to Pakistan for 13 years and he wanted to see some of his family over there. ‐ kernel: Shafiq asks Rahul “you got passport yeah? Visa everything?”
‐ catalyse: Boys in taxi, Monir in back seat: VO Rahul: “Monir was a very nice guy. He was Bengoli like me. He would never say anything bad against anybody.”
‐ kernel: Boys arrive in Pakistan, Karachi, text says: 5 October 2001.
‐ catalyse: Boys stay at mosque because they thought hotel would be expensive. They sleep there, wash themselves, prey with the others in the mosque while fans spin at ceiling.
1 3 0:03:42 ‐ catalyse: archive footage Pakistan, Diegetic sound: Traditional of demonstration: men shouting of crowd Muslim – holding black and white Karachi hadcaps striped flags and signs. A 0:03:58 man speaking through a striped flags microphone to the Non‐diegetic: vo male
crowds, small boys that reporter participate and shout
slogans out. VO of UK UK accent reporter: “Crowds reporter marching in the streets of
Karachi today. Organised by Pakistan’s Islamic parties, they’re supporters
62
of the Taliban. It’s one side of the political turmoil that seems certain to follow American military intervention in Afghanistan.”
1 4 0:03:58 ‐ Catalyse: boys spent a Pakistan, Asif ‐ Non diegetic: Rahul’s cap week in Karachi; Rahul: – “sightseeing, shopping, Karachi Rahul chillin’ out.” Shafiq went 0:06:22 to see his family, Rahul Monir ‐ Diegetic: shouting of and Monir have 2 days to crowds, hindi music Shafiq themselves while they go playing at food stall. to the fun fair. Sahid ‐ kernel: Asif “they were supposed to come to the village, but instead I went to Karachi.” Asif leaves village in van.
catalyse: mosque,Text: Binori Mosque.
We see the boys praying, and Sahid too, Asif’s cousin. Rahul asks him where he’s from in Pakistan. Differentation between pakistanis Asif: “Rahul was more like my best friend yeah, even though he was Bengali.” boys on the rd all the ‐ kernel: Boys go to time: non place. ‘Friday Praise’ in mosque.
‐ catalyse: We see a Muslim priest with Boys now also in glasses, beard and traditional dress, headcap shouting in except for Nike cap microphone (archive Rahul. footage).
Rahul tells: “people got hyped and started shouting slogans out.”
‐ kernel: VO Asif tells the priest was saying we should help Afghani people. And they wanted to see what Afghanistan is really like. ‐ catalyse: Boys sitting at local food stall outside and they are planning to go to Afghanistan to help and for experience. They
63
talk about the huge naan breads they have in Afghanistan. Shafiq asks “what language they speak there, can we speak Urdu to them, or…?” They give food to street boy.
1 5 0:06:22 Asif heard Afghanistan Pakistan ‐ Asif ‐ Diegetic sound: Adidas bag, – wouldn’t get attacked. Afghanista Rahul 12 October 2001. n Shafiq hindi music, traffic, Rahul’s 0:10:46 ‐ kernel: Boys take bus Monir beeping. Nike cap. ‐catalyse: one vomiting. Sahid Inside buss all men, then in mosque all men, praying with traditional ‐ non‐diegetic: music Pepsi sign with drums. head caps. Boys arrive at local food VO female reporter. stall, pillars with “Pepsi” flies on it. One of the boys carries green bag with “Adidas.” As they walk in, one says “check the flies UK accent up there.” Flies on floor reporter and at meat that someone’s cutting. Boy in bus again, sleeping, shot of road ahead, driver, flowers in corner of dashboard. Sun going down, half empty streets. Boy arrive at Quetta : Quetta 13 October 2001. Boys change busses, driving in colourful buss along the roads. Shot of Sahid through bars of bus. Long shot bus on mountain road. vo Shafiq: “just before we got to the border, we stopped at a mosque.”
We see boys praying in mosque. Shafiq is on toilet. Others already leave. Only miss him when they’re on the bus. Shafiq goes after them in rickshaw. Archive footage people on street, woman in burka. In background wall with “immigration check point. Pak Afghan border.” Female VO UK reporter: 64
“border trade continues uncompleted.”
Text: Pakistan Afghanistan border 13 October 2001.
Image of crowd at border: people, traffic. VO reporter “amongst those crossing are brave Afghan aid workers. They people rely on them for food and health care and to explain their needs to the outside world.”
Image of people crossing border, carrying big bags. Women in burkas. Police forming ques of people waiting to cross. ‐ kernel: Boys cross border on back of motorbikes. ‐ catalyse: People everywhere, some carrying black and white striped flags. ‐ kernel: VO Shafiq: “I ended up walking across the border. No one stopped me.” He finds his friends
Catalyse: Shafiq: “where the fuck were you, you dickheads!” Asif: “when we were across the border, that was is. It looked like ‘oh it was nothing you just cross always like you’re not even going into a different country. But once we got there, then it was a different situation.”
2 1 0:53:16 Boys are brought to Gt. Gt. Bay Asif Diegetic sound: plane Orange – Bay. Hair is shaved off, engine, dogs barking suits they’re dressed in orange Shafiq 0:55:19 suits, wearing hoods and goggles. They’re loaded Detainees into a plane. Use of archive footage Hoods
13 January 2002. Shots of Soldiers prison. Goggles
VO male UK reporter:
“More Al Quada and
65
Taliban prisoners arriving Bush Fence today at Gt. Bay, Cuba. Despite international Rumsfeld critisism, America insists the conditions inside camp Soldiers XRay are humane.”
Rumsfeld: ”The fact Guns remains that treatment is proper and there is no doubt in my mind that it is humane and appropriate Bush and consistent with the Geneva convention for the Rumsfeld most part.”
Cut to prison, cut to
Bush: “remember these or the ones in Gt. Bay are killers, they’re erm…they don’t share the same values we share.”
2 0:55:19 Cut to mcu prisoner with Gt. Bay Guards Diegetic sound: dogs Dogs – goggles behind fence. Shafiq barking, Guard: “On his knees!” crickets at night orange suits 0:57:35 Guards with dogs, taking goggles. prisoners along to other side. Guard: “You’re now a Handheld property of the U.S. marine camerawork core. This is your final destination.”
“Down.” “Keep your fucking head down.” “Keep your knees crossed.” one by one prisoners are placed in outside in the sun on their knees where they have to stay for hours. Prisoner falls on side, is taken to medic. Shafiq: “Aaaah, my eyes are stinging.” Guard: “What’s that pussy boy, you got something to say? Are you the Brit, you fucking Brit traitor.” He kicks him on his side. “Get on your knees! Get on your fucking knees, I’m not doing it for ya!”
Shafiq takes shower with goggles on and hands
66
cuffed: “Can I take these off?” guard: “shut up!” Shafiq is taken to his cell: “Don’t move!” “Get away from the fence.” “That’s your piss bucket, that’s your drinking water, alright. Stay off the fucking fence. Shut up”.
All prisoners sit quietly. night: watchtower. “Shut the fuck up.” Prisoners are sleeping
Se Seg Dura Kernel/ Catalyse Location Cha Sound/image/mes Indice que ment tion racters nce
8 0:57:35 Shafiq: “For the first Gt. Bay Shafiq Hand held Orange – month and a half we guard camerawork suits 0:59:22 never went out our cells.” A guard walks up to the prisoners Filming from inside cells and shouts: “What cell the fuck are you doing?” Cells The prisoner is hanging
his towel on the fence. He says: “I’m putting up Guards some shades.” The guard yells: “Take it down. Take it down now. Just sit down and be quiet.” shackles
Cut to a head shot of Shafiq: “They wouldn’t let us pray. You couldn’t stand up in your cell.” We cut to prisoners in orange suits in their cells and then cut back to Shafiq: “For the first two weeks we weren’t even allowed to speak to the guys next to us.”
We see two soldiers carrying a prisoner to his cell. His hand and feet are shackled. His feet are hovering above the ground as the guards carry him forward. The man is put in his cell.
Another prisoner asks: “Are you alright man?” We cut to a guard: “Shut up, no talking.” The new
67
prisoner starts praying. He’s told to stop but he won’t listen. He’s taken away by a special security force.
9 0:59:22 It’s night, we see the Gt. Bay Soldiers Close‐ups U.S flag – guards in the watchtower. The front side of the Asif Hand‐held camera darkness 1:00:50 tower portrays an American flag. Shafiq Orange suits Asif is taken out of his cell. The guard yells: Interro‐ “don’t move!” He’s taken gators Soldiers into a wooden hut where he’s interrogated. The interrogator says: “I’m from the British embassy, fence how are you?” We cut to Asif’s face. He’s silent. A tear rolls over his cheek. “I don’t want to know about your emotional state, I want to know about the state of your health,” says the interrogator. A second interrogator asks Asif what he was doing in Afghanistan and accuses Asif of wanting to join the Jihad. Asif says that’s not true. He only wanted to get married. We cut to the interrogator, who says: “Your friend has told us you went to Afghanistan for Jihad.” We now see Shafic sitting in front of the interrogators. Shafiq says “I can’t prove anything so I’m not going to say anything else.”
10 1:00:50 We cut to Shafiq being Gt. Bay Shafiq Diegetic: Orange – back in his cell. We see a suits 1:02:50 flash back of him and Ruhel Sound of chicken Rahul chasing chickens. Hood They’re both dressed in Detai‐ Boys laughing long dresses, the sun is nees goggles Sound of chopper shining. They laugh. We
cut back to Shafiq in his Dogs barking cell. Interro‐ chickens gator shouting We see a close up of Rahul’s sleeping face, a text appears in the image: Fence “Kandahar, 10 February soldier Non‐diegetic: music 2002.” Ruhel is taken by 68
soldiers to the interrogator, who says his friends have said that he’s Soldiers with Al Qaeda. “That’s bull‐shit that is.” Music Many close‐ups fades in. We cut to Rahul Muslim hat who’s head is being cap shaved and then to a head shot of a detainee in an orange suit with a hood and goggles on. We see Long dress detainees inside the airplane, sitting on the floor, we cut to a long shot of an airplane on the ground, busses leave from the airplane. A detainee is being carried by two soldiers, his hand and feet are shackled. We cut to a detainee sitting on his knees in the sun, then we see a shot of Rahul in his cell, trying to communicate with the man next to him, who speaks in a foreign language. Rahul says: “Naam: Rahul. Urdu, Urdu.” The other detainee wants to answer, but is cut off by the guard: “No talking!”
69
SEGMENTATION TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE
Se Seg Dura Kernel/ Catalyse Location Cha Sound/image/ Indice quen ment tion rachters mes ce
1 1 0:00:06 – ‐ Catalyse: a helicopter flies Yakubi Dilarwar’s ‐ Diegetic sound: Tractor in the distance over some village, brother helicopter sound, yellow taxi 0:01:15 mountain peaks, fog moves donkey over some green farmer Afghanist bird sound, fields. A man and a boy sit in an Dresses front of a stone wall, a small mooing cow, child runs around on its bare beards tjirping of crickets feet with a baby cow in the background. A woman is ‐ m‐e‐s: working on the land, men are driving on a tractor. stylised images, almost ‐ Kernel: Dilawar’s brother photographic stands next to Dilarwar’s grave and tells Dilawar was a quiet hardworking person and that he was a good and honest man who loved to drive the tractor ever since he was a little boy. The men in the village are peanut farmers but told Dilawar they would work the fields and he could go and drive the taxi.
1 2 0:01:15 – ‐ Catalyse: Dilarwar’s Yakubi ‐ Non diegetic: Yellow taxi picture. Tilt down along music starts 0:01:46 brown mountain slopes to playing while Arabic taxi driving in the distance zooming in on nummber along a dusty unsealed road, Dilawar’s picture. plate driving through a herd of goats, intercutting with close ‐ Diegetic sound: ups of taxi passing by. engine of care, sound of wheels Titles rolling over sandy road, goats shouting.
1 3 0:01:46 – ‐catalyse: Shot from inside Yakubi Taxi Non‐diegetic Red flowers the taxi we drive along on driver sound: music. Voice on 0:02:18 the backseat of the car, over. dashboard of passing by a few people in the taxi, the dry deserted Afghan landscape. Picture of his wife From a distance, we see the taxi drives away along the dusty road.
‐ Kernel: voice over of man says: “On December first,
70
2002, Dilawar, a young Afghan taxi driver took three passengers for a ride. He never returned home.”
‐ catalayse: Fade to black, title saying “secret.” Main title appears.
1 4 0:02:18– ‐ Kernel: text appears: Afghanist Shooting ‐ Non diegetic: Sky, sun, Afghanistan 2002. an, soldiers, music fades out. clouds 0:03:06 ‐ Catalyse: From inside Bagram Thomas gun helicopter, we see a soldier Curtis shooting down at the (military ‐ Diegetic: sound of scenery. police helicopter, The sun shines behind a Bagram), shooting, thunder. cloud, the helicopter flies by at a distance. Damien Long shot of dry landscape Corsetti with some buildings and (military lights in the distance. Intelligenc kernel: text appears: Bagram e Bagram) Air Base, Afghanistan.
Catalyse: men that used to be guards in Bagram tell about their first impressions in Bagram. Shot of drifting clouds at sky. Picture of Damien Corsetti in Bagram holding a gun. Black and white picture of Bagram prison.
1 5 0:03:06– ‐ Catalyse: shooting missiles, Soldiers ‐ Diegetic sound: Helicopter dusty cloud. Men with helicopter sound, guns 0:03:56 beards and headscarves Thomas looking up and pointing to Curtis shooting, bombing, the sky, quick shaky zoom sound of airplane, soldiers out and zoom in to smoke shouting of outfit cloud in the distance. soldiers. Middle Shot of airplane flying by, Eastern men in another smoke cloud men dresses and appears on the ground, a non diegetic sound: head‐
military tank drives by. voice overs. scarves.
‐ kernel: missiles VO: “After the invasion of Afhanistan, U.S. forces footage is handheld, occupied Bagram, an old less quality Sovjet airbase as a place to
collect and interrogate thousands of detainees, captured throughout Afghanistan and Pakistan.” ‐ Catalyse:
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Soldiers in their camouflage suits catching men, pointing their guns at prisoners, going “not nice people” into clay houses, finding with cu image of missiles. Arab looking man. “very evil people” VO Thomas Curtis explaining while showing these were suspected prisoners. Taliban, who where caught by special forces and brought to Bagram. “violent intentions” while showing cu VO: “these were not nice missiles. people at all, they were very evil people who definitely had violent intentions.
1 6 0:03:56– ‐ Kernel: “On December 5, Bagram Anthony Non‐diegetic Sun 2002, Dilawar, the taxi driver Morden, sound: 0:04:30 was brought to Bagram. He Military Clouds was designated a PUC: person police Music comes in, low under control, number 421.” Bagram. tone. Voice‐over. Orange suit Zoom in on prison picture of Measure Dilawar, dressed in orange board suit, standing in front of a Diegetic sound: board that measures his wind blowing, mountain height and someone’s hand leaves shaking in holds a paper in front of wind. Dilawar’s chest with his number.
‐ Catalyse: Guard tells why Zoom ins/outs Dilawar was at Bagram: “had (mobility) have something to do with... that’s interrogating about all I know.” character: we’re ‐ kernel: Zoom in Dilawar’s literally zooming in prison picture, vo: “5 days on this case. Not at after his arrival, he was a distance anymore. dead.” Sun going ‐ Catalyse: landscape with down/behind sun going down, shaking clowds refers to leafs, sand storm, clouds going to the with sun behind it, profile of darkside. Dark and mountain landscape. light: good and evil.
1 7 0:04:30– ‐Catalyse: Guard Thomas Thomas Diegetic sound: Orange suit tells about finding Dilawar: Curtis 0:05:36 “Dilawar, I think that’s his Voices name, Dilawar” Zoom in Dilawar’s prison non diegetic: music, picture. Anthony VO Anthony tells they started Morden CPR.
Intercutting Willie Slow zoom out “military happens through Brand investigation reenactment” fade to black and (militart Willie Brand tells they then fade in again:
72
worked on him till the doctor police dark/light theme. pronounced him dead. Bagram) Interviews also fade to black shady
photo Dilawar lying naked Damien on a brancard, hands tied Corsetti
Corsetti : “I was surprised that it had taken that long for one of them to die in our custody.”
1 8 0:05:36– ‐ Catalyse: Thomas: It was Thomas Archive footage Bruises 0:07:16 definitely a sense of concern Curtis because he was a second one. Slow zoom in and Cuffs ‐ kernel: VO” just a week tilt before Dilawar’s death News paper another detianee at Bagram Medical had died.” Frequent fades to exam ‐ catalyse: photos of dead black body, cross fade to report, cu “deep contusions,”
“It was the beatings he sustained at Bagram that lead to the cause of his death.”
Slow tilt along medical exam, cu of “anatomic findings” .
Fade to black Damien: “2 prisoners going down within a week of eachother, that’s bad.”
‐ Kernel: picture of tag that says “puc 421.” VO: a preliminary investigation into Dilawar’s death revealed deep bruises all over his body, but did not conclude that his treatment at Bagram was to blame.” pics of bruises in neck and slow zoom in on bruises on legs. drawing of the way Dilawar was shackled up. picture of soldier with cuffs, part of Military Investigation Reenactment. VO: “forced standing for long periods had inflamed tissue damage from blows to Dilawar’s legs.
73
But the initial Bagram press release failed to mention overhead shacklings or beatings. It declared that both detainees had died of natural causes.” Slow zoom in newspaper article saying: “U.S Military Investigating Death of Afghan in Custody.” zoom in “of natural causes.”
Se Seg Dura Kernel/ Location Cha Sound/image/ Indice quen ment tion Catalyse rachters mes ce
2 1 1:31:05 Bush: “we do not condone Bush torture.” ‐ Non‐diegetic: music Suit, flag Attorney Scott Hornton: “we button in his 1:33:00 do not condone Scott VO rever torture.Footnote: as we define Hornton torture, which means exactly (attorney) what we wish it to mean and Diegetic: nothing else.”
Pics of Bush: surrounded by crowd, touching his hands and arms. Shaking hands with people who hold American flags. Bush holding a small child.
vo: “in the elections of 2006, the Bush administration openly campaigned for harsh techniques the rest of the world defined as torture.
Bush and Cheney played on the fears of voters and politicians. If congress didn’t give them the power, to do whatever was necessary, how could Americans be safe?”
Bush: “In addition the the terrorists held at Guantanamo, a small number of suspected terrorist leaders and operatives captured during the war had been held and questioned outside the United States. In a separate program operated by the
74
central intelligence agency.”
Cut to black screen, white text: “the cia program includes:”
“waterboarding”
“forced nudity” ”forced standing (up to 40 hours)”
In meantime VO Bush: “some ask why you’re acknowledging this program now? Some believe our military and intelligence personnel involved in capturing and questioning terrorists (cut back to bush)
could now be at risk for prosecution under the war crimes act. Simply for doing their jobs in a thorough and professional way. This is unacceptable.”
Pic of white pillars at Supreme Court building.
Vo: “the president was forced to disclose his secret CIA programme and the supreme court acted to limit his war time powers.
Pic of statue of justice holding a sword. Pic of top of Supreme Court building: “Equal justice under law.”
VO: ”In the historic hamdan decision the court ruled that interrogations and trials of terrorists would be governed by the Geneva conventions.”
Bush: “this debate is occurring because of erm, the Supreme Court’s ruling that sayd that erm, we must conduct ourselves under the common article three of the Geneva Convention. And that common article three says that there won’t be no outrages upon human dignity. Eudaeuteuh, like, it’s very 75
vague. What does that mean?”
2 2 1:33:00 Zoom in on shackles on pic. Alberto Non‐diegetic: music Suit, flag Gonzales button in his ‐ “you believe that the use of (counsel to VO collar testimony which is obtained the 1:35:25 through techniques such as…” president)
Politician Alberto Gonzalez Tv has to respond to Congress presenter interrogation about issue of condoning torture. He
replies: “The concern that I would have about such a probation is what does it mean, how do you define it?”
Cut to zoom in white house.
VO: “and who define it?
The Bush administration introduced a new law that would elude the restrictions of the Supreme Court.”
Pics of Bush coming down the stairs of the white house waving, followed by his administration. Pic of a meeting of Bush with his administration.
VO of : “in a legal sense I think they wanted to discard the Constitution. And they wanted to write a new one but you can’t do that so what you do is you throw a new interpretation on the old one and the new interpretation is the executive in war time, an perhaps this war is gonna last forever, is all powerfull.”
Pic of Bush in long coat walking along rows of soldiers standing in line, Cheney walking behind him.
VO: “Congress gave the president most of what he wanted.”
Pic of white house, fade to black, tilt down along white house, fade to black.
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He would agreed to abide the Geneva conventions, so long as he could define their meaning and application. A few detainees in Guantanamo might be put on trial, but the rest would no longer have acces to habeus corpus; the fundamental legal right to challenge their detention.
Pan along security room with screens, pic of prisoner in cell.
Pic of McCain and Bush shaking hands.
VO:”Planning a run for president, even senator McCain voted for the bill, soon after the Bush administration threatened to discredit him with conservative voters.”
Fade to black.
VO tv presenter: “Burried deep inside this legislation is a provision that will pardon president bush and all the members of his administration of any possible crimes connected to the torture and mistreatment of detainees dated all the way book the September 11th 2001. At least president Nixon had general Ford to do his dirty work, president bush is trying to pardon himself.”
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Se Seg Dura Kernel/ Location Cha Sound/image/ Indice que ment tion racters nce Catalyse mes
2 3 1:35:25 VO: “the pardon did not Willie Bush American extent to front line Brand Blair ‐ soldiers.” Flags
1:37:58 Pic of soldier Willie Brand. Anthony Morden Firemen Willie Brand: “the trial was a very confusing time for me, for I’ve never been Damien candles to a trial before, I didn’t Corsetti really know what was going on.”
Text: “ Convicted: assault, Glendale maiming, maltreatment.” Walls
Anthony Morden: “well I was sent to jail, I lost my job, (…) financially it just John devastated me.” Calligan (Brand’s Text: “Pled guilty to: attorney) assault, dereliction of duty.”
Damien Corsetti: “I’m just William glad it’s over, that’s it, Cassara glad I can get on with my (Corsetti’s life.” attorney)
Text: “Acquitted: assault, maltreatment, dereliction of duty, use of hashish, Attorney performing an indecent Scott act.” Hornton
Glendale Walls: “I had to plead guilty to…” Alberto Text: “pled guilty to: Mora assault, dereliction of (former duty.” navy general John Calligan: “Rather counsel) than spend the money that was being spent for that trial, I think it could have been better spend in working on army doctrine to make sure that other people go into battle, properly equipped, properly led, and with a full understanding as what 78
their new roles and responsibilities are.“
Footage of U.S. soldiers going into battle, riding in tanks, running, capturing suspected terrorists.
William Cassara : “when a detainee is abused or a detainee claims abuse, they want somebody to take the fall for it, and it’s not gonna be the person with eagles or stars on their shoulder.”
Pic if a military commander surrounded by Middle Eastern looking kids.
“VO: “No officer was ever convicted in the Dilawar case.”
Attorney Scott Hornton:
“what does that reflect in terms of senior leadership’s intentions? Not to eradicate the abuse but to perpetuate the abuse.”
Alberto Mora: “I think the probability exists that there will be other terrorist attacks. More Americans will die. And the argument that we have to apply abuse to detainees in order to protect American lives, I find to be violative of our deepest values and to the very safety of our country. We fight not to protect lives, we fight to protect our principles.”
Pics of people holding American flags. Pic of firemen, pics of people lighting candles.
2 4 1:37:58 VO Colonel Lawrence Colonel Asif Scarves ‐ Williams: “If you say over Lawrence Ruhel the course of Afghanistan, Williams Shafiq 79
1:39:10 Gitmo and Iraque we (31 years Monir detained 50.000 people I’d in say less than 1 percent military) Guns were terrorist.”
Text:” As of Sept 11, 2006 the number of detained Moazzam Smoke reached over 83,000. Non Begg have been brought to (captured trial.” by Americans VO Colonel Lawrence , Williams: “Were some of emprisone them insurgents? d in Probably. Were almost all Bagram) of them in Iraq in particular gonna become insurgents after their treatment, erm, yes.” Jack Cloonan Images of soldiers putting (FBI a hood on captive, tying agent) hands.
Moazzam Begg: “I was kidnapped, abducted, falsely imprisoned, tortured, threatened with further torture, without charge, without trial.”
Text: “Released due to pressure from British government.”
Moazzam Begg: “Even the soldiers had said to me afterwards: it was a hell, if you weren’t a terrorist when you came in here, by the time you leave I’m sure you would be because of the way you’ve been treated.”
Image of two Middle Eastern men with their faces covered up in scarves, pointing their guns up in the air, behind them there’s a car on fire, a big dark smoke cloud in the air. The men should something in a foreign language.
VO Jack Cloonan: “you think there is a certain level of prejudice that this religion and the people
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who have hijacked it, have such a disregard for life that we turn around and say: if they think so very little of life, clearly, 9/11 exemplified that, screw them. Anything goes.”
2 5 1:39:10 Zoom in on pic Dilawar. Yakubi Villager Music Cows – VO villager, telling us they Cows mooing 1:41:01 go to Dilawar’s grave “to prey for his departed soul.” Shahpoor crickets Clay hut (Dilawar’ Cut to brother. s brother)
Shot of cemetery, then of taxi grave marker, subtitled: “Dilawar the martyr, Girl, Yakubi village.” Dilawar’s daughter Shahpoor: (subs) “My brother was innocent. He was barely a child and they killed him. Since he Old man, died I cannot taste my tea. Dilawar’s I cannot taste my food. I father cannot taste anything. Imagine you leave here and someone along the road kills you.”
Cu of little girl with orange head scarf looking into the camera. Man with white long beard and turban fixes head scarf of the small girl who sits in front of him.
Shahpoor: “In what state will your children and wife be? How would your father feel?”
Cut to grave
Vo: “It’s not surprising that at the end of all this, Dilawar, the victim was really lost. Dilawar was almost invisible in the trials. I mean you never saw pictures of him, nobody ever mentioned this man’s wife and child who were left without a husband and father. He was not part of the picture at all”
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Pic of Dilawar on tractor, pic of his wife and daughter walking through a green field.
Shahpoor standing in front of grave, taxi driving off.
Vo: “there’s a lot of people ou there who are gonna run into this system unless it’s fixed, and you only need one to sort of remind yourself of what it’s capable off.”
Slow fade to black.
2 6 1:41:01 Fade in to taxi driving U.S.A. Tony Taxi sign towards camera at night, Lagouran ‐ fade to black, fade in shot is from inside taxi showing (interrog 1:42:21 dashboard lights, fade ator Iraq) White out. Fade in to taxi sign house sliding by through screen, fade out, fade in to taxi sign on roof of car sliding by houses, fade out. VO Alberto Mora:”American values are premised upon the notion of human dignity and the sanctity of the individual.”
Fade in to image of white house at night at end of street.Fade out, fade in to xu taxi sign sliding through screen with top of White House lit in background, zoom in on top.
VO Alberto Mora: “To allow cruelty to be applied as a matter of official policy is to say that our forefathers where wrong about these inaidable rights.”
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Vo: Tony Lagouranis: “Americans obviously wanna believe that we’re somehow more moral than the rest of the world. For some reason we have a real strong desire to feel that way
Cut to Lagouranis: “and I think that’s eroding and I don’t really know what effect that’s gonna have on us. And I think a lot of people have just decided, well, you know, it’s different now, after 9/11, you know, we can’t, we can’t be good anymore. We have to get tough. And so we’ll have to see what that does to us.”
Interviewer: “what do you think?”
“I think that’s bullshit frankly, I mean, I think that we still need to try and be as good as we can be.”
Fade to black, music fade out.
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SEGMENTATION THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES
Se Seg Dura Kernel/ Catalyse Location Cha Sound/image/mes Indice quen ment tion racters ce
1 1 0:00:02 ‐ kernel: Vo: “in the past ‐ Diegetic sound: Gun – politicians promised to create a better world. They had different ‐ Non diegetic sound: Explosion 0:02:40 ways of achieving this, but that music, wind power and authority came from Bush the optimistic visions they offered their people. Those Blair very quick montage dreams failed and today, people Downing have lost faith in ideologies. street Increasingly, politicians are seen simply as managers of public media presenters life. But now they have shots (metatext?) discovered a new role that Cap uk restores their power and police authority. Instead of delivering dreams, politicians now promise doc and fiction to protect us from nightmares. intermingled by using They say that they will rescue us film fragments Rumsfeld from dreadful dangers we cannot see and do not understand. And the greatest Twin danger of all is international archive footage, cnn towers terrorism. A powerful and
sinister network with sleeper cells in countries across the threat narrative world. A threat that needs to be Binocular fought by a war on terror.” s.
light dark theme in ‐ catalyse: Shots chandeliers, images, also in words Downing Street in uk, lights of driving car shining on road at night, act of looking, Osama Bin Laden, Bush, Blair, binoculars cu eyes Arabic character, image of “CNN Exclusive Video” masked soldier with gun, magician, explosion, car driving up downing street area, man looking through binoculars, explosion, tram, presenter “what’s a dirty bomb?”, presenter “deadly discovery” , “tube attack”, explosion, “sleeper cell”, presenter “warning alert threat”, “terror are we next?”, ffw sun rising from behind mountains.
‐ kernel: VO: “But much of this
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threat is a fantasy, which has been exaggerated and distorted by politicians. It’s a dark illusion that has spread unquestioned through governments around the world, security services and the international media.”
‐ catalyse: Shot crime scene police, slowly rising arabic character, fire men, NYPD car, army jeep with UK police man walking in front.
‐ kernel: VO: “This is a series of films about how and why that fantasy was created and who it benefits. At the heart of the stories are 2 groups; the American neoconservatives and the radical Islamists. Last week’s episode ended in the late 90’s with both groups marginalised and out of power. And with the attacks of September the 11th the faiths of both dramatically changed. The Islamists, after their moment of triumph, were virtualy destroyed within months while the neo conservatives took power in Washington. But then the neo conservatives began to reconstruct the islamists (or islamyth?) they created a phantom enemy. And as this nightmare fantasy began to spread politicians realised the new power it gave them in a deeply disillussioned age.”
‐ catalyse: Shots of police men on motorbikes, captive in back of car trying to hide his face, black and white horror film fragment of camera closing in quickly on a doorway where someone is running away, another black and white shot of door opening without someone there, tower of white house, Rumsfeld with twin towers in background, bin laden with other arabs “cnn exclusive video”, someone dancing, leafs blowing along street, airplane flying in front of full moon, spinning camera shot of ceiling, airplane flying into twin towers, “invasion”, bomb 85
dropped at field, fighting arabs with guns, dead bodies spead out on field, politician, “target America”, news presenter “terror alert”, boy at beach from fiction film, looking up at giant phantom that appears, Bush and Blair turning towards us before entering building, shutting curtain in front of window.
‐ kernel: VO: “those with the darkest nightmares became the most powerful.”
‐ catalyse: Shot of exploding meteorite, ffw traffic at night, british police officer holding hand in front of camera lens, explosion, Osama Bin Laden waving while walking down the street “CNN Exclusive Video”, owl turning its head, explosion, two running women in burkas, explosion, soldier with captives with hoods on, insect falling of plant, 3 bright lights in darkness, Bush and Blair shaking hands, TITLE: the power of nightmares, the rise of the politics of fear.
1 2 0:02:40 “Part 3 THE SHADOWS IN THE Bin Non diegetic sound: Pizza hut – CAVE” Laden music, wind kfc 0:05:34 video image with data showing cars at night parked in sandy area “Afghanistan”, Zawahari Bin Osama Bin Laden sits and talks Laden to other Arab men with turbans “CNN Exclusive Video,” journalist interbiew Arab “Ayman Zawahiri may 1998.” Vo: Zawahri is follower of Egyptian Said Khutan” pic of Khutan behind bars, black and white archive footage of Khutab, cars and lights driving at street at night, pizza hut, kfc also signs in arab, arab/modern people on street, all American food shop, airplane flying over mosque, rebellion shooting at street Zawahiri captive behind bars, war shooting, demonstration, bodies at morgue, panic on the street, woman holding wounded child
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in her arms, wounded people on street, interview historian, image of Zawahiri “CNN Exclusive Video” , Bin Laden
How Khutab wanted to adopt western modernity and technology within a Muslim framework that would provide shared values instead of individualistic and selfish behaviour. Attempt to mobilise the masses failed, there was no revolution, instead a lot of violence. Then they changed strategy:
‐Kernel: instead of striking at near enemy or local regimes, they strike at the far away enemy, i.e. at the West, at America (5.29)
1 3 0:05:34– Bommings Nairobi August 1998, Nairobi Bin Diegetic sound: High vo: first time the name Bin Laden sirens, gun fire towers 0:07:20 Laden entered the public Nairobi consciousness as a terrorist mastermind. Afghanis tan Non‐diegetic sound: Shots of wounded people turbans covered in blood, smoke clouds Music, coming from destroyed Voice‐over buildings. Toyota
VO: “The suicide bombers had been recruited by Bin Laden Use of archive from the Islamist training camps footage (CNN) in Afghanistan.” Training camps that have hardly anything to do with international terrorism, but their aim was to establish Shaky hand held Islamist societies in the Muslim camera work. world and they had no interest in attacking America.
“Bin Laden helped fund some of the camps, and in return was allowed to look for volunteers for his operations. But a number of senior Islamists were against his new strategy, including members of Zawahari’s own group; Islamic Jihad.”
Shots of dusty country side, deserted roads, few people on it, sun going down. Toyota pick‐ up truck at night with men with turbans in the back. Fighter with gun on his back looking
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out over sandy landscape with mountains, people walking down sandy road, fighter aiming his gun at scenery, pan along shadowy landscape with sun going down. Shot of Osama Bin Laden, behind him a big banner with arab text. “CNN Exclusive Video”
Shaky shot Bin Laden walking, surrounded by fighters with guns. “For beyond his own small group, Bin Laden had no formal organisation until the Americans invented one for him.”
1 4 0:07:20– “Manhattan January 2001” shot Manhatt Wounde ‐ Non diegetic: music Sky of road in between sky an d people scrapers 0:10:37 scrapers. Camara shot from the front of a car driving on road in between these buildings. ‐ Diegetic: Camera looking up to building, Nairobi Bin Blood
sun reflecting on a window. Laden
Shots of destructed buildings contrast spaces: Nairobi and wounded people. sandy dusty afghan Bin figthers landscapes and Americans prosecute Bin Laden Laden westernised places: without his presence. nairobi, manhattan According to the law, they have to proof he’s head of criminal Guns organisation. Interview Jason Burke, author of ‘Al Qaeda’: FBI but also contrast use witnesses to create first Bin within middle east: Laden myth and first Al Quada previous shots of Black myth. pizza hut and KFC in horse Arabic signs. (See Fragments from fiction film, segment 2) witness drew pictor of an all powerful figure at the head of a large terrorist network that had an organised hierarchy of control. He also said that bin Laden had given this network a name: Al Qaeda. Images of Bin Laden galloping on a black horse.
It was a dramatic and powerful picture of Bin Laden, but it bore little relationship to the truth.
The reality was that Bin Laden and Ayman Zawahari had become the focus of a loose association of disillusioned Islamist militants who were attracted by the new strategy.
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But there was no organisation …”
Shaky hand held camera of Bin Laden walking with fighters.
Bin Laden used the term Al Quada only after Sept 11 when he realised that this was the term the Americans had given him.
2 1 0:40:33 VO: “What the British and City in Ali Non‐Diegetic sound: White – American governments have U.S.A Babba music, vo House done is both distort and 0:41:40 exaggerate the real nature of the threat. There are dangerous and fanatical groups around the Madrid Soldiers Houses of world who’ve been inspired by parle‐
the extreme Islamist theories, ment and they are prepared to use Gt. Bay Prisoner the techniques of mass terror on civilians. The bombings in Darkness Madrid showed this only too clearly. But this is not a new phenomenon. What is new is the way the American and Sky other governments have scrapers transformed this complex and disparate threat into a simplistic fantasy of an organised web of uniquely Barbed
powerful terrorists who may wire strike anywhere and at any moment.
Orange suit
Images of train wreck, bodies,
smoke, city lights at night. Tv
images Vo: “But no one questioned this fantasy because, increasingly, it was serving the interests of so Guns many people. For the press,
television, and hundreds of terrorism experts, the fact that
it seemed so like fiction made it Soldiers irresistible to their audiences.
And the Islamists, too, began to realise that by feeding this
media fantasy they could become a powerful organisation—if only in people’s imaginations.”
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Fragment of Ali Babba, two soldiers taking a prisoner in an orange suit with them.
2 2 0:41:40 Vo: The prime mover in this Washin‐ Abu Non‐diegetic: music Godzilla was one of bin Laden’s ton Zubay‐ ‐ associates, who had been dah captured by the Americans. He 0:43:04 was called Abu Zubaydah. He Diegetic: sirens Water began to tell his interrogators
of terrifying plots that Al Qaeda Doctor Prados was preparing, some of which, Brooklyn he said, they had copied from bridge Hollywood movies like Godzilla, which they had watched in John Afghanistan. Ashcroft, attorney Yellow Shot of Godzilla rising out of taxi water.
Interview Dr. John Prados, National Security Archive: Tele‐ “Zubaydah told the vision interrogators a set of stories show based on what he thought would alarm us. He told us, for example—coming out of a movie that had been recent at American that time, Godzilla, in which the flag Brooklyn Bridge was destroyed by the monster—he told us that Al Qaeda was interested in destroying the Brooklyn Bridge. He told us of attacks on mass transit sources like subway trains. He told us there were intentions of attacking apartment buildings and shopping centers, the Statue of Liberty, all manner of things.”
Cut to press conference room: John Ashcroft, attorney: “Recent intelligence reports suggest that Al Qaeda leaders have emphasised planning for attacks on apartment buildings, hotels, and other soft or lightly‐ secured targets in the United States.”
Cut to another press conference:
“Terrorists are considering physical attacks against US financial institutions.”
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2 3 0:43:04 Foot of Godzilla crushing a car U.S.A. Abu on the street. Zubay‐ ‐ dah Picture of Abu Zubaydah 0:46:10 VO: “And Abu Zubaydah also told his interrogators of a Dr. terrifying new weapon the Theodor Islamists intended to use: an e explosive device that could Rockwell spray radiation through cities, the “dirty bomb.”
Cut to CBS evening news: news Lewis presenter looks into the Koch camera, in background we see “Terror Alert.”
Presenter: “First, a CBS News exclusive about a captured Al Qaeda leader who says his fellow terrorists have the know‐how to build a very dangerous weapon and get it to the United States.
Images of news paper, text on paper says “dirty bomb”
VO: “And the media took the bait. They portrayed the dirty bomb as an extraordinary weapon that would kill thousands of people, and, in the process, they made the hidden enemy even more terrifying. But, in reality, the threat of a dirty bomb is yet another illusion.”
Images of a digital clock, an explosion with the flashing text “simulation, smoke clouds.”
“Its aim is to spread radioactive material through a conventional explosion, but almost all studies of such a possible weapon have concluded that the radiation spread in this way would not kill anybody because the radioactive material would be so dispersed, and, providing the area was cleaned promptly, the long‐term effects would be negligible. In the past, both the American army and the Iraqi military tested such devices and both concluded that they
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were completely ineffectual weapons for this very reason.
Image of people walking down the street, man with long blue coats working in a factory hall.
We cut to an interview with Dr. Theodore Rockwell who tells us
the danger of a dirty bomb is not that big.
Images of men in yellow and white suits with breathing masks on, searching the area.
Cut to interview with Lewis Koch, bulletin of atomic sciences: The dirty bomb—the danger from radioactivity is basically next to nothing. The danger from panic, however, is horrendous. That’s where the irony comes. This—instead of the government saying, “Look, this is not a serious weapon; the serious danger of this is the panic that would ensue, and there is no reason for panic. Don’t panic.”
Image of atomic bomb exploding.
British narrator: “Ladies and gentlemen, this is not the end of our show; however, something very much like this could happen at any moment. We just thought we ought to prepare you and more or less put you in the mood. Thank you.
And now, back to our story.”
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Stor y outline TRHE OAD TO GUANTANAMO
THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO (0:00:00 – 0:10:46) starts with its title and then we cut to president Bush at a press conference. While we hear the press clicking their cameras Bush stands behind a speaker’s desk, the American flag in the background. He states “the only thing I know for certain is that these are bad people. And we look forward working closely with the Blair government to deal with the issue.” In the mean time we cut to Blair looking at Bush and then we cut back to Bush again. Next, we see a boy, Asif, looking at himself in the mirror while he’s brushing his teeth. His voice‐over tells us his parents found a bride for him in Pakistan and they want him to get married. We cut to a headshot of the real Asif telling the story through an interview. We cut back to the boy again and see him packing his bag and passport. His mother says something in foreign language to him, then, in English, she tells him to hurry up. We follow the boy arriving in Pakistan. We see him at the airport, while a text appears: “28 september 2001.” Asif takes a taxi to his village. Along the way we see boys playing in a river at the side of the road, while the car makes its way through the busy traffic. Asif’s voice‐over tells us he saw the bride and he wants to marry her. He rings his friends Ruhel, Shafiq and Monir who are back in England and invites them to his wedding in Pakistan. When he rings Rahul, the film intercuts between Rahul in his house in England and Pakistan where Asif phones from some small store sitting on the floor surrounded by cans. A man in a long dress stands in the background. We see a head shot of Rahul, who tells us in an interview he wanted to go to Asif because he is his friend. Rahul packs and says goodbye to his family: he’s hugging everyone and they all stand outside the house to wave him off. His little brother shouts: “come back soon.” Rahul replies “yeah, I come back soon.” Rahul meets Shafiq and Monir on the street where the taxi is waiting. We cut to a head shot of Shafiq, who tells us he wanted to go to Asif’s wedding, plus he hadn’t been to Pakistan for 13 years and he wanted to see some of his family over there. Shafiq asks Rahul “you got passport yeah? Visa everything?” The boys sit in the taxi to the airport. We see Monir sitting in the back seat while we hear Rahul’s voice‐over: “Monir was a very nice guy. He was Bengoli like me. He would never say anything bad against anybody.” The boys arrive in Pakistan, a text says: “5 October 2001.” They stay at a mosque because they thought a hotel would be expensive. They sleep there, wash themselves and pray with the others in the mosque while fans spin at the ceiling. We see archive footage of a demonstration: men with beards and turbans holding black and white striped flags and signs. A man speaks through a microphone to the crowds, we cut to little boys that participate and shout slogans out. A male voice‐over with an English accent reports: “Crowds marching in the streets of Karachi today. Organised by Pakistan’s Islamic parties, they’re supporters of the Taliban. It’s one side of the political turmoil that seems certain to follow American military intervention in Afghanistan.” The boys spent a week in Karachi; Rahul and Monir go “sightseeing, shopping, chillin’ out.” Shafiq goes to see his family. Rahul and Monir have two days to themselves while they go to the fun fair. Asif says: “They were supposed to come to the village, but instead I went to Karachi.” Asif leaves his village in a van. We cut to a mosque, while the text appears: “Binori Mosque.” We see the boys praying. Asif brought his cousin Sahid with him. Asif tells us: “Rahul was more like my best friend yeah, even though he was Bengali.” The boys go to the ‘Friday Praise’ in the mosque. We see a Muslim priest with glasses, beard and a traditional Muslim head cap shouting in a microphone. These shots look like archive footage. Rahul tells us: “People got hyped
93 and started shouting slogans out.” The voice‐over of Asif says the priest was saying they should help Afghani people. And they wanted to see what Afghanistan is really like. Next, the boys are sitting at a local food stall outside and they are planning to go to Afghanistan: to help the people and for the experience. They talk about the huge naan breads they have in Afghanistan. Shafiq asks: “What language they speak there, can we speak Urdu to them, or…?” A boy comes begging and they give their food to the street boy. Asif says he heard Afghanistan wouldn’t get attacked. A text appears: “12 October 2001.” The boys get on a bus. One of them is vomiting. They’re on the bus with only men. Later on, they’re in mosque with other men, praying with their traditional head caps on. The boys then arrive at a local food stall, we see pillars with “Pepsi” on it. One of the boys carries a green bag with “Adidas.” As they walk in, one says “check the flies up there.” We cut to flies on the floor and buzzing around meat that someone’s cutting. The boys get back on the bus again, they’re sleeping. We cut to a shot of the road ahead, then to the driver and the flowers in the corner of the dashboard. The sun is going down, the streets are half empty. They arrive at Quetta: a text says: “Quetta 13 October 2001.” The boys change busses and they’re driving in a colourful bus along the road. We see a shot of Sahid through the bars of the bus, followed by a long shot showing the bus on a mountain road.Shafiq’s voice‐over tells us: “Just before we got to the border, we stopped at a mosque.” We see the boys praying in the mosque. Shafiq is on the toilet, while the others already leave. They only miss him when they’re on the bus. Shafiq goes after them in a rickshaw. We see archive footage of people on the streets; a woman in a burka, crowds walking with in the background a wall that says “immigration check point. Pak Afghan border.” A female voice‐over with an English accent reports: UK “border trade continues uncompleted.” A text appears: “Pakistan‐Afghanistan border 13 October 2001.” We see images of a crowd at the border: people are moving through the heavy traffic. The female reporter continues: “Amongst those crossing are brave Afghan aid workers. The people rely on them for food and health care and to explain their needs to the outside world.” People are crossing the border, carrying big bags. We see women in burkas and police men getting people to form queues to cross the border. The boys cross the border on the back of motorbikes. There’s people everywhere, some carrying black and white striped flags. Shafiq’s voice‐over tells us: “I ended up walking across the border. No one stopped me.” He finds his friends and shouts: “Where the fuck were you, you dickheads!” We cut to a head shot of Asif, saying: “When we were across the border, that was is. It looked like ‘oh it was nothing you just cross always like you’re not even going into a different country. But once we got there, then it was a different situation.” In the second sequence I selected (0:53:16 – 1:02:50) the boys are brought to Guantanamo. Bay. Their hair is shaved off, they’re dressed in orange suits, wearing hoods and goggles. They’re loaded into a plane. A text appears: “13 January 2002.” We see shots of a prison. A male voice‐over with English accent says: “More Al Quada and Taliban prisoners arriving today at Gt. Bay, Cuba. Despite international critisism, America insists the conditions inside camp X‐Ray are humane.” We cut to Rumsfeld: ”The fact remains that treatment is proper and there is no doubt in my mind that it is humane and appropriate and consistent with the Geneva convention for the most part.” We cut back to the prison and then to Bush saying: “remember these or the ones in Gt. Bay are killers, they’re erm…they don’t share the same values we share.” We see a prisoner with goggles on behind the fence. A guard shouts: “On his
94 knees!” The guards are holding dogs on a leach, they’re taking prisoners along to the other side of the fence. A guard shouts: “You’re now a property of the U.S. marine core. This is your final destination.” Another guard yells: “Down. Keep your fucking head down. Keep your knees crossed.” One by one prisoners are placed in outside in the sun on their knees where they have to stay for hours. A prisoner falls on his side, he is taken to a medic. Shafiq is on his knee too. He shouts: “Aaaah, my eyes are stinging.” A guard comes up to him: “What’s that pussy boy, you got something to say? Are you the Brit, you fucking Brit traitor.” He kicks him on his side. “Get on your knees! Get on your fucking knees, I’m not doing it for ya!” Shafiq takes a shower with his goggles on and his hands cuffed: “Can I take these off?” he asks. The guard shouts: “shut up!” Shafiq is taken to his cell, the guard yells: “Don’t move! Get away from the fence. That’s your piss bucket, that’s your drinking water, alright. Stay off the fucking fence. Shut up.” All prisoners sit quietly. It’s night, guards are looking from their watch tower. A guard shouts “Shut the fuck up” into the silence. Prisoners are sleeping. We cut to a head shot of Shafiq: “For the first month and a half we never went out our cells.” A guard walks up to the cells and shouts: “What the fuck are you doing?” The prisoner is hanging his towel on the fence. He says: “I’m putting up some shades.” The guard yells: “Take it down. Take it down now. Just sit down and be quiet.” We cut to a head shot of Shafiq: “They wouldn’t let us pray. You couldn’t stand up in your cell.” We cut to prisoners in orange suits in their cells and then cut back to Shafiq: “For the first two weeks we weren’t even allowed to speak to the guys next to us.” We see two soldiers carrying a prisoner to his cell. His hand and feet are shackled. His feet are hovering above the ground as the guards carry him forward. The man is put in his cell. Another prisoner asks: “Are you alright man?” We cut to a guard: “Shut up, no talking.” The new prisoner starts praying. He’s told to stop but he won’t listen. He’s taken away by a special security force. It’s night, we see the guards in the watchtower. The front side of the tower portrays an American flag. Asif is taken out of his cell. The guard yells: “don’t move!” He’s taken into a wooden hut where he’s interrogated. The interrogator says: “I’m from the British embassy, how are you?” We cut to Asif’s face. He’s silent. A tear rolls over his cheek. “I don’t want to know about your emotional state, I want to know about the state of your health,” says the interrogator. A second interrogator asks Asif what he was doing in Afghanistan and accuses Asif of wanting to join the Jihad. Asif says that’s not true. He only wanted to get married. We cut to the interrogator, who says: “Your friend has told us you went to Afghanistan for Jihad.” We now see Shafic sitting in front of the interrogators. Shafiq says “I can’t prove anything so I’m not going to say anything else.”We cut to Shafiq being back in his cell. We see a flash back of him and Rahul chasing chickens. They’re both dressed in long dresses, the sun is shining. They laugh. We cut back to Shafiq in his cell. We see a close up of Rahul’s sleeping face, a text appears in the image: “Kandahar, 10 February 2002.” Rahul is taken by soldiers to the interrogator, who says his friends have said that he’s with Al Qaeda. “That’s bull‐shit that is.” Music fades in. We cut to Rahul who’s head is being shaved and then to a head shot of a detainee in an orange suit with a hood and goggles on. We see detainees inside the airplane, sitting on the floor, we cut to a long shot of an airplane on the ground, busses leave from the airplane. A detainee is being carried by two soldiers, his hand and feet are shackled. We cut to a detainee sitting on his knees in the sun, then we see Rahul in his cell, trying to commu‐ nicate withhis neighbour, who speaks in a foreign language. Rahul: “Naam: Rahul. Urdu,
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Urdu.” The other detainee wants to answer, but is cut off by the guard: “No talking!”
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Story outline TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE
The opening sequence of the film (0:00:00 – 0:07:30) starts with green fields that are covered in fog. We see hear a cow mooing. The sun shines from behind a cloud, a helicopter flies by. At the beginning of the film we see Dilawar’s brother standing in front of Dilawar’s grave in his home town Yakubi in Afghanistan. First we’re presented with shots of village life: a small boy running on his bare feet, a woman working on the fields, several men driving along on a tractor, a man leading his donkey into the field. Dilawar’s brother has a beard and wears a turban and a long dress. He tells us what a good hard working man Dilawar was. He says Dilawar loved driving the tractor since he was a little boy. He became a taxi driver while they worked on the fields. We see a picture of Dilawar with other men on the tractor. Music fades in and the title appears. We see a taxi driving towards us through a dusty landscape, pushing goats aside. We see a close up of the wheels passing us by. Shot from inside the taxi, we drive along on the back seat, while a voice over says: “On December first, 2002, Dilawar, a young Afghan taxi driver took three passengers for a ride. He never returned home.” Next we see the dark silhouette of a soldier. He’s firing his weapon from the back of a helicopter into the landscape beneath him that is still lit by the mellow light of a sunset. We cut to the sun behind some clouds, while a helicopter flies by. We hear the voice‐over of a military police man in Bagram, Thomas Curtis, saying: “When the sun start to go down, the sand started blowing like a big dust ball. And I’m thinking, boy, is it gonna be like this every night?” In the meantime we see a long shot of Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan and then we cut to Curtis talking. Next, we see the dark profile of mountains, set against an evening light sky with some pink and yellow coloured clouds. We hear one of the soldiers say “these were not nice people at all, they were very evil people who definitely had violent intentions.” While we hear the voice‐over of the soldier saying this, we see a close up of a man’s face, who has a beard, a moustache and he’s wearing a turban. Then we cut to a captive, men in long dresses with beards, some wearing Muslim caps. They walk by a soldier who’s pointing a gun at them. When the soldier is actually uttering the words “violent intentions,” we cut to some missiles. Soldiers tell about how they found Dilawar dead in his cell. We see a slow zoom in on Dilawar’s prison pictures, where he’s wearing an orange suit. The camera slowly zooms in on pictures of the cells and the shackles on the ceiling. We see pictures of the dead body of another detainee who died in the same week as Dilawar. The voice‐over comments that the news paper reported the de at hs , but failed to mention the overhead shackling and beatings; “It declared that both detainees had died of natural causes.” In the final sequence of TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE (1:31:05 – 1:42:21) Bush states: “We do not condone torture.” We cut to Attorney Scott Hornton: “We do not condone torture, footnote: as we define torture, which means exactly what we wish it to mean and nothing else.” We see pictures of Bush surrounded by a crowd, touching his hands and arms. He’s shaking hands with people who hold American flags and on another picture he’s holding a small child. In the mean time we hear the voice‐over say: “In the elections of 2006, the Bush administration openly campaigned for harsh techniques the rest of the world defined as torture. Bush and Cheney played on the fears of voters and politicians. If congress didn’t give them the power, to do whatever was necessary, how could Americans be safe?” We cut to Bush stating: “In addition the terrorists held at Guantanamo, a small number of suspected terrorist leaders and operatives captured during the war had been held and questioned outside the United States. In a separate program operated by the central intelligence agency.” While we hear Bush talking we cut to a black screen, with 97 the white text: “the CIA program includes: “waterboarding,” “forced nudity,” ”forced standing (up to 40 hours).” Bush’s voice‐over continues: “Some ask why you’re acknowledging this program now? Some believe our military and intelligence personnel involved in capturing and questioning terrorists could now be at risk for prosecution under the war crimes act. Simply for doing their jobs in a thorough and professional way. This is unacceptable.” Next we see a picture of white pillars at the Supreme Court building. The voice‐ over of the commentator says: “The president was forced to disclose his secret CIA programme and the Supreme Court acted to limit his war time powers. We see a picture of a statue of justice holding a sword, followed by a picture of the top of the Supreme Court building, which says: “Equal justice under law.” The voice‐over comments: ”In the historic Hamdan decision the court ruled that interrogations and trials of terrorists would be governed by the Geneva conventions.” We cut to Bush: “This debate is occurring because of erm, the Supreme Court’s ruling that said that erm, we must conduct ourselves under the common article three of the Geneva Convention. And that common article three says that there won’t be no outrages upon human dignity. Eu‐da‐ eu‐t‐euh, like, it’s very vague. What does that mean?” As we slowly zoom in on a picture of shackles and then cut to a Congress interrogation where politician Alberto Gonzales has to respond to Congress as they demand an explanation about using torture on detainees. Gonzales replies: “The concern that I would have about such a probation is what does it mean, how do you define it?” We cut to a slow zoom in on the White House while the voice‐over says: “and who define it? The Bush administration introduced a new law that would elude the restrictions of the Supreme Court.” We see pictures of Bush coming down the stairs of the White House, followed by his administration. Next we cut to a picture of Bush in a meeting with his administration. We hear the voice‐over of one of the experts that’s being interviewed in the film: “In a legal sense I think they wanted to discard the Constitution. And they wanted to write a new one but you can’t do that so what you do is you throw a new interpretation on the old one and the new interpretation is the executive in war time, an perhaps this war is gonna last forever, is all powerful.” In the mean time we see a picture of Bush in a long coat walking along rows of soldiers standing in line, Cheney walking behind him. The voice‐over of the commentator says: “Congress gave the president most of what he wanted.” We are presented with a picture of the White House, then a fade to black, followed by a tilt down along the White House until we fade to black again. The voice‐over tells us that Bush would have agreed to abide the Geneva conventions, so long as he could define their meaning and application. A few detainees in Guantanamo might be put on trial, but the rest would no longer have access to habeus corpus; the fundamental legal right to challenge their detention. We pan along a security room with video screens and then we cut to a picture of a prisoner in his cell. We see a picture of McCain and Bush shaking hands while the voice‐over comments: ”Planning a run for president, even senator McCain voted for the bill, soon after the Bush administration threatened to discredit him with conservative voters.” We fade to black. We see Bush signing a paper while we hear the voice‐over of a television presenter saying: “Burried deep inside this legislation is a provision that will pardon president bush and all the members of his administration of any possible crimes connected to the torture and mistreatment of detainees dated all the way book the September 11th 2001. At least president Nixon had general Ford to do his dirty work, president Bush is trying to pardon himself.”
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While we see a picture of soldier Willie Brand, we hear the voice‐over of the commentator: “The pardon did not extent to front line soldiers.” We cut to Willie Brand: “The trial was a very confusing time for me, for I’ve never been to a trial before, I didn’t really know what was going on.” In the image, the text appears: “Convicted: assault, maiming, maltreatment.” We cut to Anthony Morden: “Well I was sent to jail, I lost my job, financially it just devastated me.” A text appears: “Pled guilty to: assault, dereliction of duty.” Next, we see Damien Corsetti: “I’m just glad it’s over, that’s it, glad I can get on with my life.” A text appears saying: “Acquitted: assault, maltreatment, dereliction of duty, use of hashish, performing an indecent act.” We cut to Glendale Walls who tells he had to plead guilty. We see the text: “pled guilty to: assault, dereliction of duty.” Next, we cut to Brand’s attorney John Calligan who comments: “Rather than spend the money that was being spent for that trial, I think it could have been better spend in working on army doctrine to make sure that other people go into battle, properly equipped, properly led, and with a full understanding as what their new roles and responsibilities are. “We see footage of U.S. soldiers going into battle, driving tanks, running and capturing suspected terrorists. Attorney William Cassara comments: “When a detainee is abused or a detainee claims abuse, they want somebody to take the fall for it, and it’s not gonna be the person with eagles or stars on their shoulder.” In the mean time we see a picture of a military commander surrounded by Middle Eastern looking kids. The commentator’s voice‐over takes over and says: “No officer was ever convicted in the Dilawar case.” We cut to attorney Scott Hornton: “What does that reflect in terms of senior leadership’s intentions? Not to eradicate the abuse but to perpetuate the abuse.” While we see pictures of people holding American flags, firemen and pictures of people lighting candles we hear former navy general counsel Alberto Mora: “I think the probability exists that there will be other terrorist attacks. More Americans will die. And the argument that we have to apply abuse to detainees in order to protect American lives, I find to be violative of our deepest values and to the very safety of our country. We fight not to protect lives, we fight to protect our principles.” The voice‐over of colonel Lawrence Williams tells us: “If you say over the course of Afghanistan, Gitmo and Iraque we detained 50.000 people I’d say less than 1 percent were terrorist.” A text appears:” As of Sept 11, 2006 the number of detained reached over 83,000. None have been brought to trial.” Again we hear colonel Lawrence Williams: “Were some of them insurgents? Probably. Were almost all of them in Iraq in particular gonna become insurgents after their treatment, erm, yes.” In the mean time we see images of soldiers putting a hood on a captive and tying his hands. We see ex‐ detainee Moazzam Begg: “I was kidnapped, abducted, falsely imprisoned, tortured, threatened with further torture, without charge, without trial.” In the image appears the text: “Released due to pressure from British government.” Moazzam Begg continues: “Even the soldiers had said to me afterwards: it was a hell, if you weren’t a terrorist when you came in here, by the time you leave I’m sure you would be because of the way you’ve been treated.” We see an image of two Middle Eastern men with their faces covered up in scarves, pointing their guns up in the air, behind them there’s a car on fire, a big dark smoke cloud escapes into the air. The men shout something in a foreign language. We hear the voice‐over of FBI agent Jack Cloonan: “You think there is a certain level of prejudice that this religion and the people who have hijacked it, have such a disregard for life that we turn around and say: if they think so very little of life, clearly, 9/11 exemplified that, screw them. Anything goes.” We cut to a slow zoom in on a picture of Dilawar. Then we cut to a villager from
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Yakubi village, telling us they go to Dilawar’s grave “to prey for his departed soul.” We see Shahpoor, Dilawar’s brother, a shot of a cemetery and then of a grave marker. A subtitle appears: “Dilawar the martyr, Yakubi village.” Shahpoor says in a foreign language that is subtitled: “My brother was innocent. He was barely a child and they killed him. Since he died I cannot taste my tea. I cannot taste my food. I cannot taste anything. Imagine you leave here and someone along the road kills you.” We see a close up of a little girl with an orange head scarf looking into the camera. A man with a white long beard and turban fixes her head scarf. Shahpoor says: “In what state will your children and wife be? How would your father feel?” We cut to the grave again. We hear a voice‐over saying: “It’s not surprising that at the end of all this, Dilawar, the victim was really lost. Dilawar was almost invisible in the trials. I mean you never saw pictures of him, nobody ever mentioned this man’s wife and child who were left without a husband and father. He was not part of the picture at all.” In the mean time we see a picture of Dilawar on a tractor, followed by a picture of his wife and daughter walking through a green field. We cut to Shahpoor standing in front of the grave and then a taxi driving off. A voice‐over says: “There’s a lot of people out there who are gonna run into this system unless it’s fixed, and you only need one to sort of remind yourself of what it’s capable off.” We slowly fade to black. We fade in to a taxi driving towards us at night, we fade to black and then fade to a shot from inside the taxi showing its dashboard lights. We fade out again to fade in to a taxi sign sliding by through the screen, we fade out and fade back in to a taxi sign on roof of car sliding by houses, followed by a fade out. We hear the voice‐over of Alberto Mora: “American values are premised upon the notion of human dignity and the sanctity of the individual.” We fade in to an image of the White House at night. The voice‐over of Alberto Mora continues: “To allow cruelty to be applied as a matter of official policy is to say that our forefathers where wrong about these in‐aidable rights.” We hear the voice‐over of Tony Lagouranis, who was an interrogator in Iraque: “Americans obviously wanna believe that we’re somehow more moral than the rest of the world. For some reason we have a real strong desire to feel that way. We cut to a headshot of Lagouranis: “and I think that’s eroding and I don’t really know what effect that’s gonna have on us. And I think a lot of people have just decided, well, you know, it’s different now, after 9/11, you know, we can’t, we can’t be good anymore. We have to get tough. And so we’ll have to see what that does to us.” The interviewer asks: “What do you think?” Lagouranis replies: “I think that’s bull‐shit frankly, I mean, I think that we still need to try and be as good as we can be.” We fade to black.
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Story outline THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES
THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES (0:00:00 – 0:10:37) starts with a male voice‐over: “In the past politicians promised to create a better world. They had different ways of achieving this, but that power and authority came from the optimistic visions they offered their people. Those dreams failed and today, people have lost faith in ideologies. Increasingly, politicians are seen simply as managers of public life. But now they have discovered a new role that restores their power and authority. Instead of delivering dreams, politicians now promise to protect us from nightmares. They say that they will rescue us from dreadful dangers we cannot see and do not understand. And the greatest danger of all is international terrorism. A powerful and sinister network with sleeper cells in countries across the world. A threat that needs to be fought by a war on terror.” In the mean time, we see shots of chandeliers, Downing Street, lights of a driving car that shine into the darkness on a road. Furthermore, we see quick flashes of Osama Bin Laden, Bush, and Blair, followed by a close up of blue eyes with heavy dark eyebrows, an image of a “CNN Exclusive Video,” portraying a masked fighter with a gun. We see a magician, an explosion, a car driving up the Downing Street area, a man looking through binoculars, another explosion, a tram, a presenter with a screen behind him that says “what’s a dirty bomb?”, another presenter with the headline “deadly discovery,” then we see the text “tube attack”, an explosion, “sleeper cell”, followed by a presenter with the headline “warning alert threat”, then the headline “terror are we next?”, which is followed by a fast forwarded sun rise from behind the mountains. We hear the voice‐over again: “But much of this threat is a fantasy, which has been exaggerated and distorted by politicians. It’s a dark illusion that has spread unquestioned through governments around the world, security services and the international media.” We see a shot of a crime scene police, then a slowly rising character with a turban on his head, fire men, a NYPD car, and an army jeep with a police man in front of it. The voice‐over tells us: “This is a series of films about how and why that fantasy was created and who it benefits. At the heart of the stories are two groups; the American neo‐conservatives and the radical Islamists. Last week’s episode ended in the late 90’s with both groups marginalised and out of power. And with the attacks of September the 11th the faiths of both dramatically changed. The Islamists, after their moment of triumph, were virtually destroyed within months while the neo‐ conservatives took power in Washington. But then the neo‐conservatives began to reconstruct the islamists, they created a phantom enemy. And as this nightmare fantasy began to spread politicians realised the new power it gave them in a deeply disillussioned age.” We see more shots of police men on motorbikes, a captive in the back of car trying to hide his face, followed by a black and white horror film fragment of a camera closing in quickly on a doorway where someone is running away. Next is another black and white shot of a door opening without someone there, we see the tower of the white house, Rumsfeld with twin towers in background, Bin Laden with other Arabs on a “CNN exclusive video”, someone dancing, leafs blowing along street, an airplane flying in front of a full moon, a spinning camera shot of a ceiling. Then we see the image of an airplane flying into the Twin Towers, we see the headline “invasion”, a bomb being dropped at a field, fighting Arabs with guns, dead bodies spread out on the field, a politician, a headline “target America”, a news presenter wit the headline “terror alert”, a fragment of a fiction film showing a boy at a beach looking up at a giant phantom that appears in front of him, we cut to Bush and Blair turning towards us before entering a building and
101 then we see someone shutting the curtains. Next is a shot of an exploding meteorite, a fast forward shot of traffic at night, a British police officer putting her hand in front of the camera lens, an explosion, Osama Bin Laden waving while walking down the street on a “CNN Exclusive Video”, an owl turning its head, an explosion, two running women in burkas, an explosion, a soldier with captives with hoods on, an insect falling of a plant, followed by three bright lights in darkness, Bush and Blair shaking hands and then the title comes in: “The Power of Nightmares, the rise of the politics of fear. Part 3 The Shadows in the Cave.” We see a video image with time codes, showing cars at night parked in a sandy area. A text appears saying “Afghanistan.” Osama Bin Laden sits and talks to other Arab men with turbans on a “CNN Exclusive Video.” A journalist interviews Ayman Zawahiri. The voice‐over tells us “Zawahri is a follower of the Egyptian Said Khutab.” In the mean time we see a picture of Khuteb behind bars. We see more black and white archive footage of Khutab, cars at night driving along a busy street, followed by images of Pizza Hut, KFC, which also have signs written in Arab. We see light tanned people with dark hair in T‐shirts and trousers while they’re shopping. Among all the people, one girl is wearing a headscarf. A man is talking on his mobile phone, a boy is wearing a T‐Shirt which says “Italia” and has the Italian flag on it. We see a shot of a restaurant with neon letters that say: “All American food.” Next we cut to a mosque while we see an airplane flying over it This is followed by images of rebels shooting at a street, Zawahiri behind bars, shooting, a demonstration, bodies at a morgue, people in panic on the street, woman holding a wounded child in her arms, more wounded people on the street, an image of Zawahiri on a “CNN Exclusive Video,” followed by an image of Bin Laden. In the mean time, the voice‐over tells us how Khutab wanted to adopt Wmodernity and technology within a Muslim framework that would provide shared values instead of individualistic and selfish behaviour. The attempt to mobilise the masses failed, there was no revolution, but, instead, a lot of violence. Then they changed strategy: “Instead of striking at near enemy or local regimes, they strike at the far away enemy, i.e. at the West, at America.” We cut to the event of the bombings in Nairobi while a text appears: “Nairobi August 1998.” The voice‐over comments that this was “the first time the name Bin Laden entered the public consciousness as a terrorist mastermind.” We see shots of wounded people covered in blood and smoke clouds coming from destroyed buildings. The voice‐ over says: “The suicide bombers had been recruited by Bin Laden from the Islamist training camps in Afghanistan. Training camps that have hardly anything to do with international terrorism, but their aim was to establish Islamist societies in the Muslim world and they had no interest in attacking America. Bin Laden helped fund some of the camps, and in return was allowed to look for volunteers for his operations. But a number of senior Islamists were against his new strategy, including members of Zawahari’s own group; Islamic Jihad.” This then, is followed by shots of a dusty country side, deserted roads with few people on it, a sun going down. We see a Toyota pick‐up truck at night with men with turbans in the back. A fighter with a gun on his back is looking out over a sandy landscape with mountains, people are walking down a sandy road, a fighter is aiming his gun at the distant scenery, we pan along a shady landscape while the sun is going down. We cut to a “CNN Exclusive Video” of Osama Bin Laden, with behind him a big banner with an Arab text. A hand held camera films Bin Laden walking. He’s surrounded by fighters with
102 guns. The voice‐over tells us: “For beyond his own small group, Bin Laden had no formal organisation until the Americans invented one for him.”A text says: “Manhattan January 2001” while we see a shot of a road in between sky scrapers. We cut to a camera shot from the front of a car, driving on a road in between these buildings. The camera is looking up to a high building, the sun is reflecting on a window. We see destructed buildings in Nairobi and wounded people. The Americans prosecute Bin Laden without his presence. According to the law, you have to proof he’s the head of a criminal organisation. We see an interview with Jason Burke, author of ‘Al Qaeda’. He says the FBI use witnesses to create the first Bin Laden myth and the first Al Qaeda myth as well. We are presented with fragments of a fiction film. The voice‐over tells us the witness drew a picture of “an all powerful figure at the head of a large terrorist network that had an organised hierarchy of control. He also said that Bin Laden had given this network a name: Al Qaeda.” We see Bin Laden galloping on a black horse. The voice‐ over continues: “It was a dramatic and powerful picture of Bin Laden, but it bore little relationship to the truth. The reality was that Bin Laden and Ayman Zawahari had become the focus of a loose association of disillusioned Islamist militants who were attracted by the new strategy. But there was no organisation.” With a shaky hand held camera shot we see Bin Laden walking around, surrounded by some fighters. The voice‐ over comments that Bin Laden used the term Al Qaeda only after Sept 11, “when he realised that this was the term the Americans had given him.” At the second half of the film (0:40:33 – 0:46:10), the voice‐over tells us “but no one questioned this fantasy, because, increasingly, it was serving the interest of so many people” We cut to a man on his horse, followed by other men on horses. They’re all wearing red headscarves. The man at the front shouts “Open Sesame!” The men are supposed to be Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. By referring to fictitious stories, the terrorism threat is portrayed as a fiction too. We see images of a chase with the flashing text: “Reconstruction.” The voice‐over continuous: “For the press, television and hundreds of terror experts, the fact that it seems so much like fiction, made it irresistible for their audiences. And the Islamists too began to realise that by feeding this media fantasy, they could become a powerful organisation again, if only in people’s imaginations.”
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ANALYIS
THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO
The first sequence of The Road to Guantanamo shows Bush at a press conference, with the American flag in the background. He states “the only thing I know for certain is that these are bad people. And we look forward working closely with the Blair government to deal with the issue.” In the mean time we cut to Blair looking at Bush and then we cut back to Bush again. Next, we cut to Asif, looking at himself in the mirror while he’s brushing his teeth. Asif’s tells us his parents found a bride for him in Pakistan and they want him to get married. We see him leaving to Pakistan. He decides to marry the bride and rings his friends to come over from England as well. From then on, we meet the other characters of Rahul, Shafiq and Monir. The film uses voice‐overs and head shots of the boys to tell their stories. The boys arrive in Pakistan, where they first stay at a mosque. They spent a week in Karachi, where they go “sightseeing, shopping, chillin’ out.” Asif joins his friends too. One time at the ‘Friday Praise’ in a mosque, the boys get the idea to go to Afghanistan to help the people over there. Surrounded by a foreign culture and unaware of the danger, the boys cross the border into Afghanistan. We cut to a head shot of Asif, saying: “When we were across the border, that was is. It looked like ‘oh it was nothing you just cross always like you’re not even going into a different country. But once we got there, then it was a different situation.” In the second sequence I selected (0:53:16 – 1:02:50) the boys are brought to Guantanamo Bay. Their hair is shaved off, they’re dressed in orange suits, wearing hoods and goggles. The film intercuts between the prison camp and images of Bush and Rumsfeld who are giving statements about the treatment of the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay. We see the boys are being cuffed and treated harshly by the guards; they’re not allowed to move or speak. The interrogators accuse the boys of terrorist involvement and won’t believe the boys are innocent.
TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE
The opening sequence of the film (0:00:00 – 0:07:30) portrays the small rural village of Yakubi in Afghanistan. At the beginning Dilawar’s brother, who has a beard and wears a turban and a long dress, stands in front of Dilawar’s grave and tells us what a nice man Dilawar was and how he became a taxi driver. In the mean time we see a picture of Dilawar with other men on the tractor. While a taxi drives through a dusty landscape a voice‐over tells us about Dilawar’s dissapearance. Next, we cut to some interviews of military police men who guarded Dilawar while he was imprisoned in the prison camp of Bagram. These soldiers tell about how they found Dilawar dead in his cell, in the mean time we see several pictures of Dilawar dressed in his orange prison suit. The voice‐over tells us another detainee had died just before Dilawar and that a press release reported the deaths, but failed to mention the overhead shackling and beatings. In the final sequence of TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE Bush states: “We do not condone torture.” The film then critisises the inhumane treatment of the detainees in the prison camps and tells us through the voice‐over, supported by pictures of Bush on campaign, how in 2006, “the Bush administration openly campaigned for harsh techniques the rest of the world defined as torture.”
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The film addresses Bush who had to reveal his ‘secret CIA programm’ in Guantanamo Bay to the media and the interrogation techniques that were being used, which can be defined as torture. Consequently, we hear the voice‐over: “The president was forced to disclose his secret CIA programme and the Supreme Court acted to limit his war time powers.” We cut to other images of Bush at a press conference and pictures of the Supreme Court building; the court has ruled that Bush has to conduct himself to the Geneva Conventions. Still, Bush manages to interpret the law in his own way and the voice‐over comments: “Congress gave the president most of what he wanted,” while we see a picture of the White House. Bush signs a paper, which pardons him and all the members of his administration “of any possible crimes connected to the torture and mistreatment of detainees dated all the way book the September 11th 2001.” Next we cut to interviews with the soldiers again, to whom the pardon didn’t apply. The soldiers tell what they were convicted for and how it influenced their lives, this is intercut with interviews with attorneys. The voice‐over says: “No officer was ever convicted in the Dilawar case.” The films also addresses the perspective of the innocent detainees as we see ex‐detainee Moazzam Begg: “Even the soldiers had said to me afterwards: it was a hell, if you weren’t a terrorist when you came in here, by the time you leave I’m sure you would be because of the way you’ve been treated.” The film ends by returning to Dilawar’s brother in Yakubi village. “My brother was innocent. He was barely a child and they killed him.” We see images of a taxi sign at night and the top of the White House in the background. Several experts give a final comment. Tony Lagouranis, who was an interrogator in Iraque, says Americans might now feel that they have to get tough, that after 9/11, they “can’t be good anymore.” However, Lagouranis is convinced that “we still need to try and be as good as we can be.” We fade to black.
TPHE OWER OF NIGHTMARES
THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES (0:00:00 – 0:10:37) narrates its story through a male voice‐ over with a British accent, who points out that the terrorist threat is an illusion, invented by politicians, who then “say that they will rescue us from dreadful dangers we cannot see and do not understand. And the greatest danger of all is international terrorism.” This is supported by quick flashes of Osama Bin Laden, Bush, and Blair, followed by a close up of blue eyes with heavy dark eyebrows, an image of a “CNN Exclusive Video,” portraying a masked fighter with a gun. We also see images of news media, with presen ters and texts like “tube attack”, “sleeper cell”, followed by the headlines “warning alert threat” and “terror are we next?”. The film addresses the politicians as ‘managers of public life’ and the way they create a illusion of a terrorist threat, which is spread by the media in a “disillussioned age.” The film provides us with a background of how Western influences entered the Muslim world, showing images of Pizza Hut and KFC, which also have signs written in Arab. We also cut to a mosque while we see an airplane flying over it. The film goes back to “the first time the name Bin Laden entered the public consciousness as a terrorist mastermind,” which is combined with shots of wounded people covered in blood and smoke clouds coming from destroyed buildings. Furthermore, the film comments on the origin of Al Quada; Bin Laden used the term Al Qaeda only after Sept 11, “when he realised that this was the term the Americans had given him.”
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At the second sequence of the film that I selected (0:39:33 – 0:46:10), the voice‐ over tells us “but no one questioned this fantasy, because, increasingly, it was serving the interest of so many people” We cut to a fragment of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. By referring to fictitious stories, the terrorism threat is portrayed as a fiction too. We see images of a chase with the flashing text: “Reconstruction.” The voice‐over continuous: “For the press, television and hundreds of terror experts, the fact that it seems so much like fiction, made it irresistible for their audiences. And the Islamists too began to realise that by feeding this media fantasy, they could become a powerful organisation again, if only in people’s imaginations.” The film further addresses the fictitious threat of ‘a dirty bomb’ and the role of the media that exaggerated it.
Actors within the narrative
The actors I distinguish in the selected sequences are Bush, Blair, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Osama Bin Laden, Downing Street, the White House, the Twin Towers, the American flag, the taxi sign on top of a car, a Pepsi sign, Pizza Hut, KFC, flies, politicians, soldiers, attorney’s, agents, terrorism experts, Arab fighters, detainees in orange suits, women in burkas, police men, dead bodies, wounded people, shackles, bars, hoods, goggles, dogs, turbans, head scarves, grave marker, mosques, sandy landscapes, crowded and polluted cities, busy traffic, skyscrapers, airplanes, helicopters, sun, clouds, lights of a car, chandeliers, a sealed road, tanks, guns, missiles, explosions, television news programmes, a news paper article, a cow, donkey and a black horse. These actors then, I will now discuss in their narrative context and the connected themes. Starting with the narrative of good and evil, I will continue with the narrative strand of law versus lawlessness, civilisation versus savageness to end with the overarching narrative of the big threat. The central question at each narrative strand will be: how are the actors used to create opposites of good versus evil, law versus lawlessness and civilisation versus savageness. What is the position of the actors within these sub‐narratives?
The ‘Good’ and the ‘Bad’
The good versus evil is the first narrative I would like to distinguish as it seems the most obvious one in all three films. THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO for instance, plays upon the opposition of the good and the bad from the very start. Right at its beginning, we see Bush at a press conference (fig. 2.1.a) stating “the only thing I know for certain is that these are bad people.” The intercutting between Bush and Blair then, implies Bush and Blair (fig. 2.1.b) are ‘good people’. They are then opposed to a shot of Asif, who is brushing his teeth (fig. 2.2). This opposition makes Asif one of these ‘bad people.’
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2.1.a 2.1.b 2.2
The first thing we learn in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO about the so called terrorists is that these are ‘bad’ people. Similarly, in TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, the detainees are described by a member of the military police as “not nice people at all,” linking them to violence, while supporting this claim by showing captives (fig. 2.3 and 2.4), followed by a shot of some missiles (fig. 2.5); here the image is used to support the soldier’s claim.
2.3 2.4 2.5
However, right at the start of TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE we’re given an image of the taxi driver Dilawar by his brother’s stories and by seeing pictures of him sitting on the tractor. He’s described as a good and honest man. The images of the small village of Yakubi portray a peaceful rural modest life with green fields, cows and people working on the fields. Dilawar’s brother has a beard and wears a long dress. However, these indices act as actors of the good. Instead of connecting the actors of the beard and long dress with images of guns and missiles, these actors are associated with quite harmless indices or rural life. So on the on hand the ‘good’ is personified in the persons of Bush and Blair, our Western political leaders. Evil on the other hand is often personified in images of Middle‐Eastern men with beards, turbans and long dresses, who sometimes hold a gun. THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES for example, shows a tight close up of bright blue eyes surrounded by a dark sun tanned skin and heavy dark eye brows, or a CNN Exclusive Video of a masked man with a gun and Osama Bin Laden surrounded by fighters. The combination of these Middle Eastern men with the indices of guns and explosions, picture them indeed as ‘not nice’ men, but as violent and evil. TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE however, starts with a portrayal of Middle Eastern men as plain and harmless. The actors of turbans, beards and long dresses hence act as presentations of good as well as evil, depending on their narrative context. What is most remarkable is the use of light and dark metaphors in the films, which are used to illustrate the narrative of good versus evil and enhance the
107 atmosphere of a luring threat. In TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE as well as in THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES we see frequently shots of sunsets. The dark silhouette of a soldier in TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE (fig. 2.6.a and 2.6.b.) is set against the light of a sunset. Next, we see the sun behind some clouds, while a helicopter flies by (fig. 2.7). Furthermore, the interviews are quite shady. The background is dark or black and the lighting on the faces of the people who are interviewed is limited to one side, which makes one side of their faces lit and the other side of the face is dark. Then there is of course the title of the film itself: TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, which implies the two sides of light and dark, which we can equal with good and evil.
2.6.a 2.6.b 2.7
The title THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES also implies darkness, as nightmares only occur when it’s dark, at night. Part 3 is called “The Shadows in the Cave,” which also refers to the theme of light and dark: a shadow can only exist when there’s light, but the shadow itself is dark. A cave is mostly dark, or in between light and dark. Similar to TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE it shows shots of sunsets or the other way around, the sun raising from behind some mountains. It shows images of chandeliers hanging in a row, switching off one by one, but or a full moon and an owl turning its head (0:02:25). Just before the title, we see three bright lights in the darkness shining into our eyes (fig. 2.8.a) followed by a shot of Bush and Blair shaking hands (fig.2.8.b, 00:02:30), who are initially the personification of the good, hence the light. All these images of Bush, Blair, the sun, the moon, men with beards wearing turbans and long dresses are nothing more than an image when standing on their own. Located within the films narrative however, these images come interact with each other and thereby their meaning is built up to something more than just the image. They become actors, portraying good and evil and constructing the symbolic power of the narrative.
2.8.a 2.8.b. 108
The ‘Law’ and the ‘Lawless’
The second narrative that can be distinguished is law versus lawlessness. How are the different actors used to create opposites of law versus lawlessness? What is the position of the actors within this subnarrative? In the first ten minutes of THE POWER OF NIGHTMARE, Bin Laden is prosecuted, even though he’s absent. However, to be able to do that the law requires that Bin Laden must be the head of a criminal organisation. Consequently, according to the film, ‘Al Qaeda’ was invented as Bin Laden’s criminal organisation by the Americans. This way through the narrative, terrorism becomes a criminal act, which is lawless. The idea of the lawless we see in opposition then to the American law, which is associated with the narrative of the good, the righteous. In THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO we hear the voice‐over commenting on the international worries about the inhuman conditions in Guantanamo Bay. Right after that Rumsfeld reassures us the conditions are humane. Here, Rumsfeld, a powerful politician, is the law, as he determines what is human and not. Furthermore, the law is presented by shots of the Supreme Court Building, like the white pillars (fig. 2.9.a), a statue in front of the building (fig. 2.9.b) and the top of the building (fig. 2.9.c). White is here the color of justice. The Supreme Court Building and its color, remind us of The White House, that within the narrative of the law versus the lawlessness, comes to mean the law as well, representing the American system. America is the law, which is clearly visible by the American flag painted on the front of the watch tower at the prison camp in Guantanamo Bay. The flag, which is iconic for the American culture, stands for the law: within the camp, the Americans make up the rules.
2.9.a 2.9.b 2.9.c
So on the one side, the law is portrayed by the building of the Supreme Court, the color white and the American flag. On the other hand there are the lawless. In TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, we see two Middle Eastern men, whose faces are covered up in scarves. Pointing their guns up in the air they shout something in a foreign language to the camera while they’re standing in front of a car that is on fire. We hear the voice‐over of FBI agent Jack Cloonan, who comments: “You think there is a certain level of prejudice that this religion and the people who have hijacked it, have such a disregard for life that we turn around and say: if they think so very little of life, clearly, 9/11 exemplified that, screw them. Anything goes.” Here, not only the Middle Eastern men, who are portrayed as terrorists, are the lawless, but the comment of Cloonan implies the Americans become lawless too, as ‘anything goes.’
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Furthermore, the theme of the lawless is enacted by the detainees. The law versus the lawless narrative can be connected to the theme of human versus dehumanizing. Since the suspected terrorists are associated with lawlessness and criminal acts, they are treated very badly. In TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE sergeant Ken Davis says: “We were also told these people are nothing but dogs. And all of a sudden you start looking at these people as less than human.” They way prisoners are treated in TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, as well as in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO, are significant inhumane. The shackled detainees in orange suits with goggles and hoods are actors of the American law as well actors of the inhumane; the detainees are imprisoned based on the American law, at the same time these indices refer to their improper treatment. The detainees act as artefacts of war, with no identity since they all look the same; they don’t exist as humans, only as numbers. They’re deprived from their senses: they can’t move and they’re not allowed to speak or look up. Their vision is taken away by putting hoods on their heads or blinding them with immensely big goggles, like in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO (fig. 2.10 and 2.11). Located within the narrative of the film, the indices of Rumsfeld, the Supreme Court House and the White House come to mean the law, which is opposed to Bin Laden and images of detainees, who are ‘the lawless.’ The narrative of good versus evil and law versus lawlessness are interrelated in the sense that the actors of the law operate on the same level as the actors of the good. They’re located in the same ‘field of meaning’ so to speak. The same applies to the actors of the lawless, which fall in the same category as the actors of evil. Within the broader narrative however, who is lawless and who is not, becomes ambiguous. In TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, Bush is criticized for interpreting the law in his own way and ignoring the Geneva conventions. Here politicians become actors of the lawless because they condone torture. This way the supposed ‘good people’ like Bush and Cheney become the lawless, which operates on the same level as the category of evil. The detainees become the victims, rather than the lawless. Again, this is an example of the changeability of the way certain indices act, a fluidity of meaning that is dependent on the narrative.
2.10 2.11
The ‘Civilised’ and the ‘Savage’
A third narrative in these films is civilisation v ersus savageness. How are the different
110 actors used to create this opposition? Where do we locate the actors within this sub‐ narrative? In all three films we see images of Afghanistan; wide shots of deserted dusty golden brown landscapes with some mountains sometimes. In THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES these images are contrasted with shots of modern buildings, like the sky scrapers of Manhattan. This way, locations are used to distinguish civilised cities characterised by their structured roads and their modern looking buildings from deserted wild landscapes. If we do see an image of a city in the Middle East, it is characterised by it chaos of people and traffic. This way, civilisation becomes highly associated with the West. Furthermore, the films make a distinction between civilisation versus savageness by showing well known labels from the West, like Diesel, Nike, GAP and Adidas. The boys in Guantanamo Bay are actors of the civilised, or modern, as well as of the traditional, since they wear Western labels; Rahul wears a Diesel T‐shirt (fig. 2.12) while the others wear long dresses and traditional Muslim head caps. We see the boys at a local food stall with Pepsi signs, but the building looks quite old and flies are buzzing around (fig. 2.13).
2.12 2.13
The meaning of well‐known Western labels becomes established in these films by contrasting these images with ‘savage’ circumstances of flies buzzing around meat and busy polluted streets. Moreover, we see political leaders like Bush and Blair dressed in business suits, whereas the Middle Eastern men are wearing long comfortable dresses that look rather plain and practical. The difference in clothing refers to the theme of modernity versus tradition. In THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES we see the Western labels of Pizza Hut and KFC incorporated in a Middle Eastern city (fig. 2.14), which actually seems to blur the sharp line between the Middle East and the West. Here, the Western labels act as signs of modernization. At the same time, we’re presented with a mosque, which is an actor of the traditional. It’s typical then to see the mosque in the same image with an airplane (fig. 2.15), which creates a contradiction of tradition, the mosque, and an actor of modern technology, the airplane. Other than being an actor of tradition, the mosque is also an actor of religion and in this sense is similar to the Muslim head caps, which are too referring to the Islam. Airplanes as well as helicopters and cars are actors of modern transport technology in these films, which are opposed by actors of traditional transport, like donkeys and horses. The yellow taxi in TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE as a modern mean of transport, is opposed to the dusty empty landscape (fig. 2.16), which is an actor of the savageness compared, especially compared to the images of America’s skyscrapers and well structured roads.
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Besides the meaning of the airplane as being a product of modern technology, the airplane is also shown as a weapon; THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES portrays images of the September 11 attack where we see an airplane crashing into the Twin Towers. The airplane attack is more than destroying two skyscrapers since the Twin Towers were an illustration of the glory of American architecture as well as American (economic) welfare and power. The fact that these are not random skyscrapers but the Twin Towers, an icon of the American culture, makes this an attack on the whole of America and everything it stands for.
2.14 2.15 2.16
The ‘Big Threat’
On what axis then, do these sub‐narratives of ‘good versus evil,’ ‘law versus lawlessness’ and ‘civilized versus savageness’ operate? Actors come to mean different things as they are located in different narrative strands. Bush for instance, initially stands for the good, but also for the law and (American) civilization. The narrative strands and their related themes of ‘light versus darkness’; ‘human versus inhuman,’ and ‘modernity versus tradition’ are closely connected, sometimes overlapping. It’s important to note that the narratives don’t just create opposites, but question them too, blurring the line between seemingly clear categories of what is good and evil, lawful or lawless, civilized or savage. Though being different, all three sub‐narratives are embedded within the larger ‘threat’ narrative, a threat that can exist because of the creation of opposite categories of good and evil, law versus lawless and civilized or savage. The threat element then, stems from the binary categorization which creates a circumstance in which it either goes one way or the other. The threat narrative is mainly constructed by the actors that function by a combination of the evil, the lawless and the babarian. Inherent to the threat narrative in these films then, is the theme of fiction and reality; what is true and what is false. On a non‐semiotic level, the theme of truth and falsity occurs in camerawork, vocabulary as well as in seemingly objective ‘God‐like’ voice‐overs. Though non‐semiotic, I would like to discuss these elements briefly because they do add to the narrative construction of the ‘threat,’ which provides the context for the semiotic actors and helps to create a reality that appears to be objective and natural. First of all then, on a formal level, the films are documentaries by themselves and therefore are automatically based on a claim of ‘truthfulness.’ The inclusion of interviews in all three films with terrorism experts, soldiers, attorneys, investigators or ex detainees, in combination with the frequent use of archive footage in THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES for example, plus the use of pictures of Bagram prison and its detainees in
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TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE all add up to the plausibility and level of truthfulness of these films. The camerawork is often hand held and shaky, following the prisoners from up close, sometimes even from within their prison cell. In THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO the camera follows Asif being dragged to his cell at Guantanamo. The way Asif is being pulled and shaken by the guard, the same way the camera moves as it goes after Asif (0:56:52). Later on, a low camera angle from within the cells, puts us right next to the prisoners, looking upwards to the guard standing in front of their cells. This makes it all seem even more realistic. The vocabulary as well, touches upon the issue of truth versus falsity. Especially in THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES the voice‐over speaks more than once about “illusion,” “fantasy” and a “phantom enemy.” In THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO the boys are repeatedly interrogated, where they keep stating “That’s not true man,” “that’s bull‐shit,” (01:01:29) “I’m telling you the truth, I’m not from the Jihad man,” “I can’t prove anything, and you’re not gonna believe me, so I’m not gonna say anything else.” When Rahul is being questioned and accused of being a member of Al Qaeda, he answers: “that’s bull‐shit that is.” The interrogator tells him his friends said that about him, Rahul responds: “I don’t think you’re even telling me the truth” (01:01:55). The threat narrative we find too in the first ten minutes of THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, which unravels the issue of terrorism and its status as “A powerful and sinister network with sleeper cells in countries across the world. A threat that needs to be fought by a war on terror.” Here, the threat image is reinforced and at the same time ridiculed by images from horror films accompanied by sounds of panting and screaming. Furthermore, the editing is very fast paced: we see images ‘racing’ by of Osama Bin Laden, Bush, Blair, later on we see an explosion, then a cut to a car driving up to Downing Street area, a man looking through binoculars and then we cut to another explosion. The fast paced editing and disorienting music creates an image of cha os and confusion, enhancing a feeling of threat. Direct semiotic actors of threat are images of demonstrating masses. THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO includes fragments of a demonstration in Karachi, Pakistan (fig. 2.21a and 2.21.b, 0:03:42), which is presented to us as a media report, hearing a male British voice‐over reporting the demonstration and addressing the ‘political turmoil.’ By the somewhat blurry look of it, it seems that these fragments are archive footage; it makes the images seem realistic, adding to the seemingly truthful character of media portrayals.
2.21.a 2.21.b
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Most remarkable then, is the way the role of the media is addressed by these films. Whereas in THE ROAD TO GUANTANAMO media reports are presented as truthful, in THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES the media are partly held responsible for spreading the illusion of terrorism, leaving the issue unquestioned (0:01:16). Furthermore, the film includes images of television news programmes, which flashes titles such as “target America,” “dire warning” and “terror alert” (fig. 2.22.a, 2.22.b and 2.22.c, 0:02:06). These images act as ‘media sensation devices,’ stressing the hype created by media and hence its fictitious character. The fiction created by the media is stressed by including actors like a phantom ghost that appears to a boy on the beach and the figures of Ali Babba and Godzilla.
2.22.a 2.22.b 2.22.c
In TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE the media is also critically assessed. A slow zoom in on a newspaper article functions as an actor of incompleteness regarding the truth, as the voice‐over comments that in the case of two tortured detainees who have died in Bagram: “the initial Bagram press release failed to mention overhead shackling or beatings. It declared that both detainees had died of natural causes” (0:07:04). Here too, the ambiguous role of the press in the terrorism issue is addressed. In this sense, all three films have a similar investigating character, especially regarding the use and functioning of different actors, which can change in meaning, dependent on their narrative embeddings.
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